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THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


THE  WAR  EAGLE 


A  Contemporary  Novel 


BY 

W.  J.  DAWSON 

AUTHOR  OF 

"the  fatecer  of  a  soldier" 

"ROBERT  SHENSTONE,"   ETC. 


Dulce  el  decorum  est  pro  patria  mori 


NEW  YORK:   JOHN  LANE  COMPANY 

LONDON:    JOHN    LANE,    THE    BODLEY    HEAD 

MCMXVIII 


Copyright,  tqi8, 
By  John  Lane  Company 


Press  of 

J.  J.  Little  &  Ives  Company 

New  York,  U.S.A. 


PR 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I    The  War  Eagle 9 

II    New  York 94 

III  The  House  in  the  Wood 138 

IV  Alice  Croxon :     •     •  '^^^ 

V   The  Lure i97 

VI   The  Hour .  233 

VII    The  Decision 261 

VIII    Six  Months  Later 297 


2  A  OCT'^QCC 


THE  WAR  EAGLE 


THE  WAR  EAGLE 

CHAPTER  I 
THE  WAR  EAGLE 


I  THINK  there  are  few  young  men  of  my  age  who 
have  a  more  intense  joy  in  life  than  I,  George  Waller, 
have.  There's  a  phrase  used  by  Lucas  Malet  which 
haunts  my  memory — she  speaks  in  one  of  her  novels  of 
the  "magnificent  rage  of  living."  I  think  this  is  exactly 
what  one  feels  on  such  a  morning  as  this,  when  every 
sight  and  sound  is  an  incitement  to  live.  The  air  ac- 
tually sparkles;  it  seems  full  of  glittering  bubbles,  of 
a  fine  effervescence,  which  goes  to  the  head  like  wine. 
The  lake  is  a  deep  blue,  and  this  also  sparkles  with  a 
thousand  motes  of  light.  All  round  rise  the  fir-clad 
hills,  breathing  out  fragrance  as  the  hot  sun  bathes 
them.  Through  the  orchards,  which  the  hills  enclose, 
runs  a  song  of  falling  water.  A  hawk  hangs  poised 
above  the  chicken  houses,  sole  inimical  symbol  in  this 
realm  of  peace. 

I  have  been  here  nearly  a  month,  and  I  am  surprised 
at  the  hold  which  the  place  has  taken  on  me.  I  thought 
I   was  a  townsman,   to  whom  lighted  streets,   clubs, 

9 


lo  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

restaurants,  theatres,  and  all  the  daily  interchange  of 
mind,  were  vital.  I  know  now  how  little  these  things 
really  meant  to  me  by  the  ease  with  which  I  have 
relinquished  them.  Was  there  any  true  interchange 
of  mind  in  all  those  rapid  contacts  of  opinion  round 
restaurant  tables  or  in  club  smoking-rooms?  I  greatly 
doubt  it.  Minds  are  like  flowers,  they  only  open  in 
clean  air  and  silence.  As  I  sit  here  and  write,  tlie  still- 
ness is  so  great  that  I  can  hear  my  watch  tick.  It 
seems  to  me  I  can  also  hear  my  mind  think.  One's 
real  thoughts  are  very  shy,  not  easily  persuaded  out  of 
secrecy.  One's  opinions  are  another  thing — they  have 
an  impudent  liking  for  display.  My  old  life  in  New 
York  was  provocative  of  opinions;  but  my  thoughts 
were  hidden  in  my  heart  like  the  nesting  birds  in  these 
wide  woods. 

Perhaps  it  is  a  little  presumptuous  to  suppose  that 
one  can  ever  ascertain  his  real  thoughts;  they  are  so 
overlaid  by  convention,  so  flawed  by  pressure  of  all 

kinds  from  without. No,  these  are  not  the  right 

words.  The  word  that  comes  nearest  to  my  meaning 
is  the  old  word  "hypocrite,"  in  its  original  sense  of 
"play-actor."  We  are  all  play-actors,  I,  no  less  than 
others.  We  adopt  emotions,  and  simulate  them  so  cun- 
ningly that  we  come  to  imagine  them  our  own.  I 
rather  think  I  have  adopted  the  emotions  of  the  literary 
man.  I  have  thought  of  fame,  won  by  my  pen,  as  the 
supreme  prize  of  existence.  Not  the  object  of  exist- 
ence— I  am  not  foolish  enough  for  that,  but  the  prize, 
the  efficient  symbol  of  success.  The  curious  thing  to 
me  is  the  suddenness  with  which  this  prize  has  ceased 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  ii 

to  be  of  value,  its  rapid  depreciation  and  disappear- 
ance. And  the  cause  lies  in  nothing  more  remarkable 
than  a  month's  separation  from  the  life  of  cities,  a 
month  of  primitive  existence  in  this  unspoiled  land. 

For  the  life  here  is  very  primitive.  A  dozen  years 
ago  these  shores  were  clothed  with  an  unbroken  forest; 
twenty  years  ago  the  only  voyagers  on  the  lake  were 
Indians  in  their  frail  canoes.  A  few  are  still  here; 
they  come  about  midsummer,  erect  their  tepees  on  the 
shore,  and  go  hunting  in  the  hills.  To-day,  all  along 
the  lake  side,  there  are  ranches,  each  one  of  which  rep- 
resents incalculable  labour.  Men  have  come  here  one 
by  one,  nearly  all  of  them  English,  unaccustomed  to 
physical  toil,  but  eager  for  adventure.  They  have  had 
to  cut  down  the  forest  trees,  blast  out  the  stumps,  col- 
lect mountains  of  stones  from  the  land,  build  their  own 
houses,  plant  their  orchards,  establish  their  own  forms 
of  social  life.  I  am  living  in  one  of  these  home-built 
houses;  it  is  called  "a  shack."  An  English  cottager 
would  probably  regard  it  with  disdain,  for  it  is  built  of 
rough  wood,  and  has  the  appearance  of  a  large  chick- 
en-house, except  for  a  verandah  that  runs  along  its 
front.  But  it  has  a  garden  and  lawn,  and  a  runnel  of 
pure  mountain  water  flows  past  its  door,  and  from  its 
always  open  windows  is  seen  a  great  panorama  of  hills 
and  woods.  I  wake  every  morning  with  delight,  and 
watch  the  great  cone  of  mountain  to  the  north  flame  like 
a  torch;  I  sleep  with  that  blessed  sound  of  running 
water  in  my  ears,  and  the  fresh  breeze  upon  my  face. 
What  can  I  ask  more  ?  I  am  happy :  happier  far  than 
I  ever  was  in  cities. 


12  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Certainly  I  have  earned  my  happiness,  if  ever  man 
did.  I  see  no  reason  why  I  should  not  record  that 
boast.  We  are  too  much  afraid  of  boasting,  which  is 
an  entirely  honest  temper,  and  it  should  be  encour- 
aged rather  than  reprimanded.  I  l)elieve  our  fear  of 
boasting  really  comes  from  the  old  pagan  terror  of 
the  jealous  gods,  who  hate  men  to  be  happy  and  take 
particular  pains  to  rob  a  man  of  happiness  the  moment 
he  makes  sure  of  it.  Well,  I  am  quite  willing  to  sub- 
mit my  case  to  the  gods.  I  am  twenty-six,  and  of  these 
years  twenty  have  been  years  of  labor.  My  childhood 
was  vexed  with  lessons;  then  came  school  with  its 
perpetual  examinations,  and  then  Oxford  with  more 
examinations,  and  then  years  of  writing,  at  the  rate 
of  eight  or  nine  hours  a  day,  in  the  slow  attempt  to 
achieve  authorship.  I  have  had  to  live  for  certain  ob- 
jects— I  have  never  simply  lived.  By  that  I  mean  life 
has  never  been  an  end  in  itself. 

From  to-day  I  am  resolved  that  things  shall  be  dif- 
ferent. I  will  not  live  again  for  things;  I  will  just 
live.  I  wonder  whether  my  entire  education  has  not 
been  wrong  in  this  respect,  that  it  has  emphasised  the 
objects  for  which  I  should  live,  instead  of  the  immense 
boon  of  mere  living?  With  one  man  the  object  of  Hv- 
ing  is  success,  with  another  wealth,  with  another  the 
degree  of  culture  which  ensures  distinction;  it  does 
not  much  matter  whether  the  end  presented  is  good  or 
bad,  the  essential  thing  is  that  it  withdraws  the  thought 
from  the  act  of  life  to  the  purpose  of  life,  and  makes 
the  purpose  our  tyrant.  What  it  really  amounts  to  is 
that  we  live  to  get  something,  not  to  be  something. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  13 

And  all  the  time  life  itself  rushes  past  like  a  joyous 
pageant  in  which  we  have  no  part.  We  lift  our  tired 
eyes  from  books,  seeing  it  for  a  moment,  perhaps  with 
a  dull  yearning,  and  plunge  back  again  into  books,  with 
a  false  sense  of  something  noble  in  our  refusal  to 
admit  its  challenge.  This  is  what  Puritanism  has  done 
for  most  of  us.  It  has  filmed  our  eyes  with  serious- 
ness. It  has  tried  to  make  our  lives  noble  and  has 
only  succeeded  in  making  them  arid. 

Perhaps  it  is  the  kind  of  life  lived  here,  in  this  re- 
mote outpost  of  the  world,  which  suggests  these  ideas. 
I  have  come  to  know  these  stranded  adventurers  of 
Fruitvale  pretty  thoroughly.  They  certainly  work,  but 
it  is  at  the  compulsion  of  their  own  wills,  and  not  for 
a  master.  Why  they  left  England  is  a  secret  which 
no  one  reveals,  but  the  motive  with  most  of  them 
was  a  desire  for  freedom.  To  possess  a  bit  of  land, 
to  raise  one's  own  crops,  to  build  one's  own  house,  to 
be  independent — this  was  the  bait  that  drew  them 
across  the  seas.  There's  a  Robinson  Crusoe  in  every 
English  boy,  and  he  doesn't  die  with  boyhood.  He 
whispers  at  the  ear  of  the  city  clerk,  the  man  whose 
business  isn't  prospering,  the  professional  man  whose 
career  seems  blocked :  "Own  yourself,  come  adventur- 
ing," is  his  message.  And  then,  some  day,  the  clerk 
sees  a  flaming  poster  in  a  window  with  a  picture  of 
hills  impossibly  blue,  orchards  in  snowy  blossom,  a 
neat  ranch-house  covered  with  roses,  and  a  lake  with 
white  sails — and  his  unseen  Robinson  Crusoe  says, 
"Here's  your  chance."  Of  course  the  real  thing  isn't 
at  all  like  the  pictured  thing.    The  orchard  isn't  there, 


14  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

and  no  rose-covered  ranch-house  awaits  him;  but  the 
dream  of  it  is  there.  So  this  man  who  has  never 
worked  with  his  hands  has  to  learn  to  plough  and 
plant  and  build,  to  be  his  own  carpenter  and  plumber, 
to  do  a  hundred  jobs  he  would  have  scorned  in  Eng- 
land, and  to  work  in  a  way  he  would  never  have  im- 
agined possible.  For  the  first  time  he  realises  that 
manual  labour  is  sweet,  because  it  is  for  himself;  and 
it  is  not  discreditable,  because  every  one  does  it.  The 
man  on  the  next  ranch  may  have  been  a  graduate  of 
a  university  or  the  cadet  of  a  titled  family,  but  he 
wears  blue  jeans  like  the  rest,  and  is  not  ashamed. 
The  conventional  values  of  life  are  lost;  every  one 
has  a  chance  of  being  valued  for  what  he  is  intrinsi- 
cally. This  is  exhilarating  to  the  spirit,  as  the  free  open 
air  life  is  to  the  body.  Going  Crusoe-ing  is  at  all 
events  good  fun,  and  St.  Robinson  is  certainly  a  much 
wholesomer  patron  saint  than  St.  Simon  Stylites. 

Are  these  people  happy?  Not  as  happy  as  they 
think  they  are,  for  you  don't  leave  personal  anxieties 
behind  by  crossing  oceans;  but  if  you  think  you  are 
happy,  that's  three  parts  of  the  recipe  for  happiness. 
At  all  events,  they  are  a  cheerful  community.  No 
doubt,  if  they  stop  to  think,  they  may  note  in  them- 
selves a  certain  deliquescence  of  ambition;  but  that  in 
itself  may  be  an  element  of  happiness.  The  less  bag- 
gage of  ambition  we  carry  on  our  shoulders  the  more 
freely  can  we  step  out  along  the  roads  of  destiny. 
That's  a  queer  sentiment  from  my  pen ;  but  you  get  to 
feel  in  that  way  if  you  live  in  a  place  like  this.  It 
reminds  me  of  Emerson's  Apologue  of  the  quiet  stars 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  15 

and  the  excited  politician :  "Why  so  hot,  Httle  man  ?" 
Why  indeed,  with  this  benignant  landscape  round  you, 
this  little  world  where  all  the  harsh  sounds  of  Hfe  are 
harmonised  into  a  distant  rhythmic  murmur,  soft  as 
the  wind  among  the  trees? 

It  is  nearly  noon,  and  round  the  lake  I  see  the  ap- 
proaching steamer,  which  is  our  only  link  with  the 
larger  world.  She  is  painted  white,  and  in  the  dis- 
tance looks  like  a  white  swan,  pushing  her  silent  way 
through  the  long  glassy  ripples.  She  brings  with  her 
food  for  our  tables,  letters,  papers,  but  scarcely  ever 
a  passenger.  Papers?  They  seem  a  gratuitous  im- 
pertinence. Who  cares  for  news  of  that  vexed  outer 
world,  when  this  little  world  is  so  much  at  peace,  so 
happy  in  its  round  of  simple  duties  and  affections? 

II 

Button  has  just  been  up  to  see  me,  asking  me  to 
make  a  set  at  tennis  this  afternoon.  We  have  an  ex- 
cellent court  on  a  little  bluff  above  the  lake,  and  all 
Fruitvale  gathers  there  on  these  July  afternoons.  But- 
ton is  my  nearest  neighbour,  a  lean  young  fellow  with 
an  old  face  and  a  boyish  manner.  He  pretends  to 
work  in  the  mornings,  and  wears  blue  jeans  like  the 
rest,  but  they  are  an  affectation.  His  hardest  work 
is  caring  for  his  lawn,  and  doing  odd  jobs  about  the 
house,  for  he  is  one  of  the  few  residents  who  have  a 
private  income.  His  real  interest  in  life  is  tennis,  and 
each  afternoon  sees  him  arrayed  in  spotless  white  duck, 
recruiting  players  for  the  game.  I  don't  know  his  his- 
tory, but  he  lets  it  be  supposed  that  he  was  once  in 


l6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

the  army,  and  was  retired  through  broken  health.  But, 
hke  the  rest,  he  says  httle  of  his  past,  and  is  wholly  en- 
gaged in  the  living  of  the  present,  which,  for  him, 
means  getting  the  best  time  he  can  out  of  life. 

Morrison  came  on  the  same  errand  about  ten  min- 
utes later.  He  is  physically  a  great  contrast  to  But- 
ton— a  big-boned  handsome  man,  with  a  touch  of  grey 
round  his  temples  and  on  his  close-cropped  pointed 
beard.  He  drifted  into  Fruitvale,  so  they  tell  me, 
four  or  five  years  ago  as  a  visitor,  and,  before  he  knew 
it,  succumbed  to  the  beauty  of  the  place,  and  gave  up 
hopes  of  ever  getting  out  again.  He  lives  with  his 
wife  and  child  in  a  tiny  shack  about  a  mile  up  the  lake, 
and  earns  a  little  money  by  doing  odd  jobs.  He  also 
has  some  kind  of  tenuous  income,  without  which  he 
could  not  live  at  all.  He  looks  like  a  man  who  might 
have  succeeded  in  a  professional  career,  and  he  has 
never  lost  a  certain  smartness  of  appearance.  He 
reads  a  good  deal,  subscribes  for  the  Weekly  Times, 
and  The  Graphic,  and  can  talk  intelligently  about  pub- 
lic aflfairs.  I  noticed  a  daily  paper  sticking  out  of  his 
pocket,  and  asked  him  what  was  the  news? 

"Pretty  serious  news,"  he  replied.  "It  looks  like 
war." 

"War?     Between  whom?"  I  asked. 

"Germany  and  Russia,"  he  replied. 

He  handed  me  the  paper,  and  across  its  front  page 
there  glared  the  words,  "War  Imminent." 

"The  old  kind  of  European  squabble,"  said  Button. 
*'It  flares  up  every  second  or  third  year,  but  it  never 
comes  to  anything." 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  17 

"I'm  not  so  sure  it  will  come  to  nothing  this  time," 
said  Morrison  gravely. 

"O,  rubbish,"  retorted  Dutton.  "You  know  better. 
War  has  become  obsolete.  Germany  may  bluster,  but 
she  is  much  too  wise  to  take  the  risks  of  a  European 
war  to-day.    Europe  wouldn't  permit  it." 

"Europe  may  not  be  able  to  prevent  it,"  said  Mor- 
rison.    "What  do  you  think,  Waller?" 

Now  it  happened  that  not  long  before  I  left  New 
York  a  pacifist  friend  had  given  me  Norman  Angell's 
book,  The  Great  Illusion,  and  because  I  was  fond  of 
my  friend,  in  spite  of  what  I  thought  his  untenable 
opinions,  I  had  promised  him  to  read  it.  I  did  so  with 
reluctance,  but  as  I  read  the  book  I  found  my  interest 
in  it  growing. 

"He's  certainly  right  in  a  great  many  things,"  I 
said  to  myself.  "Modern  warfare  has  become  so 
deadly  that  it  is  impossible  upon  a  large  scale.  There 
isn't  money  enough  in  any  nation  to  finance  a  great 
war.  It  looks  as  though  war  has  broken  down  with 
its  own  weight."  And  so  I  put  the  book  down  with 
the  comfortable  conviction  that  the  Millennium  had  be- 
gun, not  as  an  interposition  of  heaven,  but  as  the  fruit 
of  a  new  human  reasonableness. 

I  remembered  the  book  now,  and  my  New  York 
friend's  passionate  pacificism,  and  a  meeting  I  had  at- 
tended with  him  in  Carnegie  Hall,  where  three  thou- 
sand people  frantically  applauded  the  well-known  lines 
about  the  battle  flags  being  furled  "in  the  Parliament 
of  man,  the  federation  of  the  world."  And  so  I  re- 
plied to  Morrison's  appeal  by  echoing  Angell's  opin- 


i8  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ions,  and  declaring  that  war  was  a  barbarous  anach- 
ronism, quite  out  of  date  in  tliis  modern  world. 

"Ikirbarism  is  never  extirpated,"  was  his  grim  reply. 
"We're  all  barbarians  still,  under  our  skins.  At  least 
lin  sure  Germans  are." 

*'0,  come,  you  fellows,"  said  Dutton  impatiently, 
"what's  the  use  of  wasting  the  time  arguing?  We've 
got  to  practise  for  the  tournament,  you  know,  and  it's 
only  two  weeks  away." 

As  I  didn't  feel  the  least  interest  in  arguing,  and 
thought  Morrison  rather  a  solemn  bore,  I  was  glad  to 
go.  The  discarded  paper  was  flung  on  the  verandah, 
and  we  went  down  the  shady  wood-path  to  the  tennis 
court,  eagerly  discussing  the  prospects  of  the  tourna- 
ment. 

All  the  women  were  on  the  tennis-court,  of  course, 
and  a  very  pretty  picture  they  made  in  their  white 
dresses,  with  the  blue  lake  for  a  background.  They 
looked  astonishingly  girlish  and  played  with  a  great 
deal  of  gay  laughter.  A  stranger  would  certainly  not 
have  guessed  that  most  of  them  were  wives,  who  had 
passed  all  the  hours  since  dawn  in  all  sorts  of  house- 
hold duties,  many  of  them  of  a  hard,  laborious  kind. 
But  this  is  one  of  the  features  of  our  Fruitvale  life 
which  is  quite  admirable — the  women  do  not  fall  into 
slovenliness  because  they  have  a  good  deal  of  rough 
work  to  do.  They  keep  a  humanising  love  of  dress, 
although  they  have  small  opportunity  of  gratifying  it, 
and  they  make  a  point  of  coming  to  the  tennis-court  as 
spick  and  span  as  they  would  be  at  an  English  garden- 
party.    To  hear  their  fresh  laughter,  and  see  their  fresh 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  19 

colour,  and  watch  the  eagerness  with  which  they  play, 
one  might  suppose  they  had  not  a  care  in  the  world. 

I  wish  I  could  make  vivid  this  idyllic  picture  of  the 
tennis-court  on  this  July  afternoon.  A  little  after  five 
o'clock  the  sun  dipped  behind  the  mountain,  the  air 
cooled  and  freshened,  and  the  long  shadow  of  the 
mountain  fell  across  the  court.  A  deeper  shadow, 
from  a  land  six  thousand  miles  away,  began  in  the 
same  instant  to  impinge  upon  our  carefree  life,  though 
we  knew  it  not.  We  were  sitting  on  the  grass,  drink- 
ing tea,  when  the  chug  of  a  launch  was  heard  on  the 
lake.  The  launch  stopped  at  the  wharf,  and  there 
stepped  ashore  a  friend  of  mine  from  Vancouver, 
Alan  Joddrel.  He  was  a  fair-complexioned  young 
Englishman,  who  had  induced  me  to  buy  land  on  one 
of  the  Western  Islands  which  I  had  never  seen,  and  I 
supposed  he  had  come  to  offer  me  some  fresh  bargain. 
We  welcomed  him  to  our  little  fete  champetre,  but  I 
noticed  that  he  was  very  silent,  and  began  to  imagine 
that  he  had  bad  news  to  communicate  about  our  mu- 
tual land  investment. 

"Anything  wrong  with  the  land?"  I  asked. 

"No,  it's  not  that,"  he  replied.  "It's  something 
bigger." 

He  drew  a  telegram  from  his  pocket,  and  said, 
"Read  that." 

It  was  from  his  brother,  who  was  in  a  government 
office  at  Ottawa,  and  read  as  follows: 

"War  is  expected  between  England  and  Germany. 
What  are  you  going  to  do?" 


20  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Well,  what  about  it?"  I  said.  "You  surely  don't 
believe  it." 

"Yes,  I  do,"  he  said.  "My  brother  has  special  means 
of  information,  and  he  wouldn't  wire  me  unless  he 
thought  the  situation  serious." 

"But  the  morning  paper  said  nothing  about  it.  It 
talked  of  war  between  Germany  and  Russia,  but  said 
nothing  about  England." 

"A  local  paper  can't  be  expected  to  have  the  latest 
news,"  he  replied.  "In  Ottawa  they  know  things  long 
before  the  press  gets  hold  of  them." 

"The  mere  whisperings  of  government  offices,"  I 
said  lightly.  "What  do  they  amount  to?  But  even 
suppose  it  were  true,  which  I  don't  for  a  moment  be- 
lieve, what  has  it  to  do  with  you,  Alan?" 

"Why,  I  should  go.  I  had  a  pretty  good  training  in 
the  Territorials  before  I  left  England,  you  know.  If 
England  fights,  Canada  will  have  to  fight  too." 

"But  you  have  a  wife  and  child,  Alan.  And  then, 
there's  the  land.  You've  got  a  year  to  run,  haven't 
you,  on  your  pre-emption?  If  you  don't  stick  to  your 
pre-emption,  you'll  lose  it.  And,  of  course,  there's 
the  land  we  hold  together.  You  know  all  about  that, 
and  I  know  nothing.'' 

"That's  why  I  came  to  see  you,  Waller.  I  may 
want  you  to  take  over  the  whole  afifair.  I  thought  it 
was  only  fair  that  I  should  put  it  up  to  you." 

I  was  startled  by  his  seriousness.  A  man  doesn't 
travel  hundreds  of  miles  to  see  a  friend  unless  he  has 
a  good  reason,  I  reflected.  But  nevertheless  the  whole 
thing  seemed  preposterous.     This  scare  of  a  war  be- 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  21 

tween  England  and  Germany  was  an  old  scare.  It 
had  happened  in  the  Boer  War,  and  again  over  the 
Agadir  affair,  but  in  each  case  had  come  to  nothing. 
Besides,  hadn't  we  been  told  again  and  again  of  late 
that  friendly  relations  with  Germany  were  an  essen- 
tial part  of  English  policy,  and  were  never  on  a 
sounder  footing?  It  was  true  that  I  had  taken  very 
scant  interest  in  international  politics,  for  I  had  been 
too  busy  writing  stories.  But  I  had  known  Germans 
at  Oxford,  young  Rhodes  scholars,  and  they  were  the 
friendliest  fellows.  And  I  knew  that  the  Liberal  Gov- 
ernment had  enough  trouble  on  its  hands  with  Ireland, 
and  besides  this  was  pledged  to  a  great  programmiC  of 
social  reform.  Of  all  unlikely  things  the  unlikeliest 
was  that  such  a  government  at  such  a  time  should  en- 
ter on  a  great  war,  for  which  in  any  case  England  was 
totally  unprepared. 

"My  dear  fellow,"  I  said,  "do  put  all  this  nonsense 
out  of  your  mind.  There  will  never  be  a  great  Euro- 
pean War  again  in  our  day." 

"Won't  there  ?"  he  said  quietly.  "Do  you  know  that 
for  a  month  past  all  the  Germans  have  been  going 
back  to  Germany  as  fast  as  ships  could  carry  them? 
They've  been  going  from  Vancouver,  as  I  happen  to 
know.    And  the  people  at  Ottawa  know  it  too." 

"Even  if  there  were  war,  what  has  it  to  do  with  you, 
Alan?" 

"Canada  helped  in  the  Boer  War,"  he  replied,  "and 
Canada  will  have  to  help  again.  But  this  time  it  will 
be  a  much  bigger  business." 

"Well,  I  don't  believe  it,  Alan.     Come  up  to  the 


22  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

house  and  stop  over  night.  You'll  see  things  dif- 
ferently after  a  good  sleep." 

"No,  I  can't.  I'm  going  back  to  the  Coast  to-night. 
My  wife  knows  nothing  of  this,  and  I  must  tell  her. 
But  I  do  want  you  to  do  something  for  me  before 
I  go." 

"I'll  do  anything  you  want,  except  believe  your  scare 
telegram.     What  is  it?" 

"I  want  you  to  come  back  to  town  with  me  in  the 
launch,  go  to  a  lawyer,  and  accept  power  of  attorney 
for  our  joint  affairs.  It  will  make  me  easier  in  my 
mind,  if  you'll  do  this.  If  war  doesn't  come,  we  can 
revoke  the  power  of  attorney.  If  it  does,  it  will  be 
a  great  comfort  to  me  to  know  that  you'll  look  after 
my  interests." 

"Of  course,  I'll  do  it,  if  you  seriously  wish  it,  Alan. 
But  all  the  same  I  think  you've  got  a  bad  attack  of 
nerves,  and  you'd  be  far  wiser  to  stop  a  day  or  two 
with  me  on  the  ranch." 

"That's  what  I  expected  of  you,"  he  said,  grasping 
my  hand.  "I  think  we'd  better  go  now;  I've  ordered 
the  launch  to  bring  you  back  because  I  was  sure  you 
would  come." 

Button  and  Morrison  came  up  while  we  were  talk- 
ing, and  I  introduced  them  to  Alan. 

"Mr.  Joddrel  thinks  there's  going  to  be  war  between 
England  and  Germany,"  I  said. 

"No  fear,"  said  Button.  "Germany  knows  better 
than  that.     What  about  the  British  Navy?" 

"But  what  about  the  British  Army?"  said  Morri- 
son. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  23 

"The  finest  in  the  world,"  retorted  Button. 

"But  the  smallest,"  retorted  Morrison. 

The  women  gathered  round  us,  and  were  waiting  to 
be  introduced.  There  was  little  Mrs.  Button,  almost 
pathetically  young,  and  Mrs.  Vernon,  a  pretty  Lon- 
doner, and  Alice  Croxon,  who  had  come  from  New 
York  to  spend  the  summer  with  Mrs.  Vernon.  They 
were  quite  different  in  type,  but  as  they  stood  there, 
each  dressed  in  white,  they  might  have  passed  for  sis- 
ters. Mrs.  Button  made  friends  by  her  girlish  charm, 
Mrs.  Vernon  by  her  vivacity  as  well  as  her  Bresden- 
china  prettiness,  and  Alice  Croxon  by  her  nimbleness 
of  mind  and  compact  grace.  Buring  my  month  upon 
the  ranch  I  had  seen  a  good  deal  of  all  three;  we  had 
bathed,  boated,  and  gone  on  picnics  together.  Alice 
Croxon  I  knew  to  be  a  very  worldly  little  person, 
whose  worldHness  was  only  partially  concealed  by  that 
alluring  grace  of  hers;  but  she  knew  how  to  charm 
men,  and  make  them  her  bond-servants.  The  married 
men  were  always  running  errands  for  her,  to  the  im- 
perfectly concealed  annoyance  of  their  wives;  and  if 
her  tennis-shoe  wanted  tying  there  were  half  a  dozen 
candidates  for  the  privilege.  Of  course  I  had  been 
fascinated  too ;  daily  propinquity  on  the  lake  and  in  the 
woods  had  settled  my  job.  I  suppose  I  was  in  love 
with  her,  but  I  had  kept  my  clearness  of  eye,^  and  was 
perfectly  aware  of  her  defects.  She  knew  this,  and 
didn't  seem  to  care.  I  think  she  liked  me  all  the  better 
because  she  was  under  no  necessity  of  hiding  her  faults 
from  me,  or  pretending  to  be  something  which  she 
was  not. 


24  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"What  are  you  men  all  looking  so  solemn  about?" 
said  Mrs.  Vernon. 

"My  friend,  Mr.  Joddrel,  thinks  there's  going  to  be 
war  between  England  and  Germany,"  I  replied. 

"O,  I  thought  you  were  discussing  the  tournament," 
said  Mrs.  Dutton.  "I  think  I  shall  enter  for  the  dou- 
bles. I  hope  Mr.  Joddrel  will  be  here,  and  help  us. 
My  husband  says  there's  a  tremendously  strong  team 
coming  from  King's  Bay,  and  we  shall  have  hard  work 
to  beat  them." 

"And  they've  got  Captain  Canning,"  said  Mrs.  Ver- 
non, with  a  shrug  of  her  pretty  shoulders.  "He's  got 
the  swiftest  service  vou  ever  saw.  Isn't  it  dreadful 
for  a  poor  player  like  me?" 

No  one  took  the  least  notice  of  my  remark  about  the 
threatened  war.  They  all  began  to  chatter  about  the 
tournament.  Presently,  when  I  went  down  to  the 
launch  with  Joddrel  they  all  came  with  us,  and  Mrs. 
Vernon  was  very  earnest  in  requesting  me  to  go  to  a 
certain  shop  in  town,  and  get  for  her  a  new  racket, 
which  had  been  ordered  a  week  before,  and  had  not 
come. 

"It's  such  a  lovely  evening,  I  wish  we  were  coming 
with  you,"  said  Mrs.  Dutton. 

"Capital  notion.  Come  along.  There's  plenty  of 
room  in  the  launch,"  I  said. 

The  three  women  were  eager  to  accept  the  invita- 
tion. They  didn't  get  many  opportunities  of  the  kind. 
If  they  went  down  the  lake  to  Summerton  (which,  by 
the  way  was  our  local  metropolis  and  quite  a  thriving 
place)   they  usually  took  the  market  boat  on  Satur- 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  25 

days.  Going  to  Summerton  in  a  launch  on  a  fine  July 
evening  meant  much  the  same  thing  to  them  as  a  coach- 
ride  to  Brighton  means  to  a  London  girl,  who  knows 
Brighton  only  by  excursion  tickets  on  the  railway. 

"But  what  about  the  men?"  laughed  Mrs.  Vernon. 
"They'll  have  to  get  their  own  suppers,  and  what  will 
they  do  without  us?" 

"Learn  to  appreciate  you,"  said  Alice  Croxon  in 
her  soft  drawling  voice. 

Button  looked  rather  surly  at  the  arrangement.  He 
was  the  kind  of  man  who  never  values  his  wife  till 
he  sees  her  going  off  with  some  one  else,  and  then  be- 
comes stupidly  jealous.  But,  of  course,  there  was 
nothing  he  could  do  but  acquiesce,  and  so  the  launch 
was  pushed  off  from  the  wharf  with  a  gay  mimicry 
of  farewell,  in  which  Button  joined  with  a  fairly  good 
grace. 

If  one  had  been  ever  so  much  disposed  to  encourage 
solemn  thoughts,  it  would  have  been  quite  impossible 
in  such  company.  The  evening  itself  was  of  a  per- 
fect beauty,  such  an  evening  as  men  remember  long 
years  after  with  wonder  and  yearning,  when  they  are 
sick  or  old.  One  side  of  the  lake  lay  in  purple  shadow, 
the  mountains  on  the  other  side  still  held  the  sunset, 
and  the  sky  was  like  a  great  rose-red  banner  hung 
across  the  lake.  The  surface  of  the  water  was  here 
smooth  as  glass,  there  rippled  by  a  gust  of  wind,  that 
brought  with  it  the  penetrating  odour  of  resinous  pine- 
trees,  the  smell  of  grass  and  cattle,  and  the  scent  of 
flowers.  Even  Alan  forgot  his  ominous  telegram,  and 
was  soon  as  gay  as  the  rest  of  us.     We  chattered, 


26  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

laughed,  jested,  and  finally  sang,  less  for  delight  in  the 
music  than  tlie  childish  pleasure  of  hearing  the  echoes 
of  our  song  given  back  from  the  darkening  hills, 

I  soon  got  through  my  business  with  Alan  and  saw 
him  off  on  the  eight  o'clock  train  for  the  Coast.  It 
was  about  nine  when  we  left  Summerton  and  were 
again  upon  the  lake.  The  sky  was  now  like  a  canopy 
of  dark  velvet,  sprinkled  with  jewels.  Lights  shone 
out  from  the  windows  of  the  little  houses  on  the  hill- 
sides, as  though  the  sky  had  spilled  some  of  its  stars 
among  the  woods.  Mrs.  Vernon  wanted  to  sing,  but 
the  other  two  women  made  no  response  to  her  sug- 
gestion. Then  Mrs.  Dutton  and  Mrs.  Vernon  fell  to 
talking  about  some  domestic  matters,  something  to  do 
with  the  best  methods  of  preserving  fruits,  and  pres- 
ently about  this  eternal  tournament,  which  was  quite 
the  biggest  thing  in  their  immediate  future.  As  for 
me,  I  was  rather  glad  to  sit  silent,  and  gaze  into  the 
dark  mystery  of  the  lake,  and  try  to  guess  by  the  un- 
folding of  the  hills  how  our  course  lay. 

Just  before  we  reached  our  little  bay,  Alice,  who 
sat  beside  me,  pressed  my  arm,  and  said  in  a  low  voice, 
"Do  you  really  think  there's  going  to  ho  war?" 

"Of  course  I  don't.     Are  you  anxious?" 

"Well,  yes,  just  a  little.  You  see  a  friend  of  mine 
wants  me  to  go  with  her  to  Paris  in  October,  and  if 
there  was  war,  I  suppose  we  shouldn't  go.  And  I  do 
so  love  Paris.    Don't  you?" 

The  voice  of  Dutton  hailed  us  from  the  wharf  at 
that  moment,  and  I  was  spared  an  answer. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  27 


ni 

It  will  be  no  news  to  my  friends  that  I  am  of  an  in- 
trospective turn  of  mind — I  shouldn't  be  a  novelist  if 
I  wasn't.  I  am  very  curious  about  other  people's  mo- 
tives, and  I  probe  my  own  with  more  frequency  than 
is  good  for  me.  When  I  was  quite  a  child  I  had  a 
habit  of  comparing  myself  with  other  boys  to  my  own 
disadvantage.  Most  of  the  other  boys  I  met  seemed 
to  be  vigorous  little  animals,  with  a  well-poised  self- 
sufficiency,  whereas  I  was  shy  and  diffident.  In  their 
presence  I  often  suffered  agonies  of  shame  over  this 
self-distrust  of  mine.  There  was  nothing  I  coveted 
so  much  as  a  sense  of  self-sufficiency,  which  seemed 
to  be  theirs  by  nature,  for  I  saw  that  they  really  en- 
joyed life,  while  life  for  me  was  a  constant  struggle 
to  be  something  that  I  was  not  by  nature. 

I'm  reminded  of  this  condition  of  mind  this  morn- 
ing by  seeing  some  of  the  children  swimming  in  the 
lake.  They  came  trooping  down  to  the  water  with 
shouts  of  excitement,  stripped  themselves  rapidly,  and 
stood  in  the  sunlight  with  their  young  bodies  poised 
upon  the  diving-board,  eager  for  the  plunge.  I  have 
often  wondered  why  artists  have  given  all  their  atten- 
tion to  the  female  body,  and  have  rarely  seen  the 
beauty  of  the  male,  which  in  a  young  boy  is  one  of  the 
most  perfect  objects  in  creation.  Certainly  I  have 
rarely  seen  anything  more  beautiful  than  the  slim  grace 
of  these  boys'  bodies,  poised  in  the  tense  attitude  of 
the  diver  above  the  glass-green  clear  water,  with  the 


28  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

reddish  tree-boles  and  the  yellow  sands  for  a  setting 
of  the  picture. 

But  the  thing  that  set  me  thinking  was  the  absolute 
fearlessness  of  these  boys.  The  water  is  seven  feet 
deep  at  the  diving-board,  and  none  of  them  have  more 
than  an  elementary  knowledge  of  swimming.  Yet 
they  do  not  hesitate  for  an  instant.  Now,  in  their 
place,  I  should  have  been  full  of  apprehension.  I 
should  have  thought  of  all  the  people  who  had  been 
drowned  in  the  lake,  and  of  all  the  strange  fish  which 
swim  in  it,  and  above  all  of  the  discouraging  fact 
that  the  water  was  seven  feet  deep,  and  that  I  was  less 
than  four  feet  tall.  My  imagination  would  have  be- 
come morbidly  active,  and  I  should  have  had  to  make 
a  strong  deliberate  effort  to  overcome  it  before  I  could 
have  dived.  My  heart  would  have  risen  into  my 
throat  as  I  dived,  and  even  in  the  act  of  diving  I 
should  have  been  plagued  by  the  fear  that  I  might 
never  rise  to  the  surface  again.  I  am  a  strong  swim- 
mer to-day,  and  enjoy  the  sport  thoroughly,  but  even 
to-day  I  am  never  wholly  free  from  a  foreboding  of 
disaster  when  I  am  in  deep  water.  My  childish  fears 
still  persist  because  my  imagination  is  still  in  excess 
of  my  reason. 

I  remembered  these  childish  sensations  as  I  watched 
the  boys  in  the  water,  and,  just  to  assure  myself  that 
I  was  not  afraid,  I  climbed  to  the  roof  of  the  boat- 
house,  and  took  the  long  dive,  to  the  immeasurable 
delight  of  the  boys.  I  repeated  the  act  half  a  dozen 
times  to  please  them,  and  then  sat  in  the  hot  sun  on 
the  sands,  they  standing  round  in  an  admiring  circle. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  29 

Presently  they  went  away.  They  had  found  a  new 
sport  in  striding  logs,  and  paddling  out  into  the  lake. 

And  then  some  curious  association  of  thought 
brought  Alan  Joddrel  to  my  mind. 

While  I  had  been  writing  books,  what  had  he  been 
doing?  He  had  surveyed  unknown  lands,  forded 
streams  and  crossed  perilous  swamps,  pushed  his  way 
through  forests  piled  with  fallen  timber,  camped  on 
solitary  moufttains,  and  faced  a  hundred  times  hun- 
ger, storm,  and  danger.  Yet  he  was  by  no  means  an 
athlete.  He  was  London-born;  his  home  was  some- 
where in  a  street  of  trim  middle-class  houses,  and  his 
father  had  spent  his  days  travelling  on  a  bus  to  and 
fro  between  a  most  proper  London  suburb  and  a  most 
proper  lawyer's  office  in  Chancery  Lane.  Alan  had 
seemed  predestined  to  the  same  kind  of  life,  but  some 
drop  of  adventurous  blood  in  his  veins  had  driven  him 
out  into  the  waste  places  of  the  earth.  Who  had  really 
lived  most,  he  or  I?  Which  was  the  life  better  worth 
the  living,  mine  or  his  ? 

At  last  he  had  come  to  anchor,  had  got  his  pre-emp- 
tion of  three  hundred  acres  on  a  beautiful  shore-line, 
had  built  a  house,  married,  and  become  a  father.  And 
now,  at  the  call  of  battle,  he  was  ready  to  fling  all  this 
aside,  and  risk  his  life  in  a  much  more  terrible  ad- 
venture than  any  he  had  yet  known.  Yet  how  calmly 
he  had  spoken  of  it!  He  had  quietly  assumed  that  the 
call  was  indisputable.  The  case  was  beyond  argument. 
He  had  not  so  much  as  considered  an  alternative.  He 
had  had  some  training  in  the  Territorials  in  the  old 
country,  the  old  country  would  need  soldiers,  there- 


30  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

fore  he  must  go — thus  ran  his  simple  logic,  and  he 
found  it  inevitable. 

Lying  there  in  the  warm  sands,  thrilled  with  the  joy 
of  living,  I  confess  that  Alan's  logic  was  to  me  un- 
thinkable. The  whole  thing  appeared  monstrous.  Be- 
cause statesmen  were  fools  and  rulers  knaves,  because 
neither  had  the  commonsense  to  arrange  their  affairs 
with  a  rational  discretion,  a  young  man  who  had  no 
part  in  their  quarrel,  who  did  not  even  pretend  to  un- 
derstand it,  was  to  be  dragged  from  wife  and  child 
across  six  thousand  miles  of  sea  and  land  to  be  slain 
or  mangled  on  a  battlefield !  To  put  the  case  upon  the 
most  utilitarian  grounds,  was  he  not  manifestly  of 
greater  service  to  society  where  he  was  ?  He  had  done 
something  not  inconsiderable  to  build  up  a  great  Do- 
minion. He  was  at  the  point  in  his  career  when  he 
could  do  much  more.  He  had  ambitious  schemes  for 
developing  a  town-site  on  his  land,  and  had  boasted 
that  there  was  no  better  natural  harbour  on  the  Coast. 
Let  any  sane  jury  judge  the  case,  and  would  not  the 
inevitable  verdict  be  that  he  could  be  of  far  greater 
value  to  Canada  where  he  was  than  in  the  most  advan- 
tageous position  that  war  could  give  him?  I  had  a 
moment's  vivid  vision  of  Alan's  house  derelict  amid 
weed-grown  fields,  and  Alan's  wife  and  child  gone, 
and  he  himself  lost  to'  sight  in  rolling  battle-smoke, 
and  my  heart  rose  up  against  the  stupendous  folly  of 
it  all. 

His  life  and  mine — I  had  begun  by  comparing  them 
— dare  I  go  on  ?  I  began  to  perceive  a  peril  to  my  sat- 
isfaction,    A  dark  thought  lurked  ahead,  and  lifted 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  31 

a  venemous  head  out  of  its  ambush.  I  felt  the  old 
childish  terror  of  deep  water,  and  the  sense  of  shame 
I  had  in  the  presence  of  other  boys  who  had  no  ter- 
ror. Alan  had  no  terror  of  war.  He  was  not  im- 
aginative. Was  I  letting  my  imagination  master  me 
in  the  old  way?  Was  the  half-anger  that  I  felt  at 
Alan  for  his  cheerful  courage  in  reality  the  subtle  fruit 
of  a  lack  of  courage  in  myself? 

That  was  not  a  path  of  discovery  which  I  cared  to 
tread.  I  might  discover  too  much.  I  might  by  chance 
come  within  reach  of  that  venomous  thought  that  lay 
ambushed  and  feel  its  sting. 

"Heigho,  what  nonsense  I  am  thinking,"  I  said  to 
myself.'  "Here's  a  day  made  for  living,  not  for  think- 
ing." 

So  I  rose  from  the  warm  sand,  dressed,  and  went 
down  the  trail  whistling.  I  remembered  that  I  had 
promised  to  go  boating  with  Alice  Croxon  in  the 
afternoon. 


IV 


The  day  was  indeed  made  for  living.  The  whole 
narrow  valley  was  like  a  chamber  lit  and  perfumed 
by  the  spirits  of  Summer.  Bluebirds,  bluer  than  the 
sky,  flashed  in  and  out  among  the  apple-trees ;  a  king- 
fisher sat  watchful  on  a  cotton  tree :  delicate  humming 
birds,  half  butterfly,  half  bird,  hung  above  the  lupins 
in  our  little  garden.  With  long  slender  beaks  they 
drank  the  nectar  of  the  flowers,  their  wings  of  gauze 
moving  in  swift  ecstasy,  their  tiny  bronze  and  green 


3J  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

bodies  glittering  in  the  sun.  And  that  air,  blown  over 
a  hundred  miles  of  forest  and  sun-warmed  mountain 
summits,  where  was  there  anything  that  equalled  it? 
Even  when  the  atmosphere  was  quite  still  it  had  an 
edge  to  it,  a  tonic  freshness,  like  the  air  that  blows 
across  a  glacier.  But  every  afternoon,  with  the  great- 
est regularity,  there  came  a  long  draught  of  air  from 
the  lake,  and  then  a  gusty  breeze,  as  if  some  one  had 
opened  a  window  in  this  chamber  of  the  Summer. 
This  was  the  hour  when  I  loved  to  be  upon  the  lake. 
There  is  not  much  pleasure  in  rowing  a  boat  on  en- 
tirely placid  water :  one  misses  the  gurgling  music  of 
the  little  waves  around  the  bow,  the  running  spools 
of  foam,  and  the  handful  of  glittering  drops  flung  into 
one's  face  by  the  spirits  of  the  lake,  who  love  their  jest. 
And  this  afternoon  Alice  Croxon  was  to  come  boat- 
ing with  me. 

She  was  three-quarters  of  an  hour  late.  It  was  her 
habit  to  be  late,  not  from  a  slovenly  disregard  of  time, 
but  because  it  was  an  assertion  of  her  independence. 
Women  have  very  few  ways  of  asserting  their  inde- 
pendence; the  most  innocent  way  is  unpunctuality.  I 
fancy  also  that  they  have  a  notion  that  their  company 
is  the  more  valued  when  it  has  been  waited  for.  To 
be  told  "I  thought  you  were  never  coming"  is  a  kind 
of  inverted  compliment  on  their  appearance. 

She  made  a  charming  figure  in  her  brown  holland 
dress,  unrelieved  by  a  single  touch  of  colour.  She  was 
bare-headed,  and  the  sun  wove  glints  of  gold  into  the 
darkness  of  her  hair.  She  lay  back  on  the  red  cush- 
ions in  the  stern  of  the  boat,  holding  a  dainty  Japanese 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  33 

sunshade  above  her  head  and  I  had  plenty  of  opportu- 
nity to  observe  her. 

I  had  often  done  so,  but  I  had  never  yet  achieved  a 
satisfactory  analysis.  The  first  day  I  met  her  I  had 
jotted  down  in  my  note-book  her  outward  characteris- 
tics— "Small  head  after  the  Greek  type  of  sculpture, 
vivacious  eyes,  rather  peevish  mouth,  a  trim  figure  of 
the  most  precise  neatness,  a  slight  physique  that  does 
not  however  indicate  frailty,  rather  tenseness  of  nerve, 
finish  too  fine  to  admit  the  least  excess :  a  very  com. 
plete  little  person,  of  a  deceptive  simplicity." 

Novelists  who  know  their  business  keep  notebooki 
for  the  express  purpose  of  recording  things  like  this, 
not  knowing  when  they  may  be  of  use  to  them  in  their 
v/ork.  But  in  such  generalisations  there  is  usually 
much  to  be  sought,  and  the  more  I  had  seen  of  Alice 
Croxon  the  more  perplexing  had  she  become  to  me. 

Did  I  love  her?  Undoubtedly  I  did  in  the  way  I 
have  already  indicated,  by  virtue  of  propinquity.  No 
young  man  can  be  constantly  in  the  company  of  an  at- 
tractive woman  without  instinctively  making  love  to 
her ;  it  is  expected  of  him.  He  may  do  this  with  a  very 
imperfect  knowledge  of  her  real  qualities,  and  this  was 
my  case.  What  were  the  real  thoughts  that  went  on 
in  that  little  head?  I  did  not  know.  Part  of  her  at- 
traction lay  in  my  ignorance  of  her.  Some  parts  of 
her  mind  and  temperament  she  was  ready  enough  to 
expose.  She  professed,  as  I  have  said,  the  most  com- 
plete worldliness.  Her  most  frequent  conversation 
was  of  theatres,  matinee  idols,  concerts,  balls — all  the 
artificial  pleasures  of  a  city  life. 


34  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I  am  not  sentimental,"  she  was  fond  of  saying. 

And  because  she  said  it  so  often  I  was  suspicious 
that  it  was  a  pose.  When  a  woman  asserts  too  vigor- 
ously that  such  a  thing  is  so,  it  is  a  pretty  good  proof 
tliat  it  is  nothing  of  the  kind,  and  that  she  knows  it. 
And,  besides,  she  sometimes  forgot  her  pose.  There 
were  brief  instants  when  another  self  looked  out  of 
her  eyes,  like  a  face  in  the  window  of  a  house  one  had 
thought  deserted.  I  had  heard  her  quote  poetry  of  a 
romantic  character,  and  had  not  been  altogether  de- 
ceived by  her  apology  that  "Every  girl  learns  that 
sort  of  thing  at  school,  but  it  doesn't  follow  she  be- 
lieves it."  And  there  were  times  too  when  the  awe 
of  the  mountains  fell  upon  her:  times  when  her  face 
was  transfigured  by  a  new  look  of  wonder  and  solem- 
nity. It  was  swift  to  pass  as  a  cloud-shadow  on  the 
lake,  but  it  was  there,  and  I  tried  to  think  that  it  was 
the  indication  of  a  deeper  nature  in  her  than  she  her- 
self was  aware  of,  or  was  willing  to  admit. 

We  had  crossed  the  lake  and  were  floating  idly  in  a 
little  bay.  A  great  cotton  tree  rose  out  of  the  swampy 
shore,  and  its  blossoms  floated  down  in  constant 
showers  like  snow.  There  was  no  sound  save  the  rip- 
ple on  the  sand,  the  movement  of  the  wind  in  the 
cotton-tree,  and  a  wood-pecker  tapping  on  a  tree- 
trunk  in  the  woods. 

"Isn't  it  lovely?"  I  remarked. 

"Yes,  but  there's  an  emptiness  about  it,  don't  you 
think?" 

"Empty  of  what?" 

"Why,  life  of  course.    All  these  miles  of  shore,  and 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  35 

a  house  only  here  and  there.  All  those  great  forests, 
and  not  a  path  in  them  that  is  made  by  human  feet. 
I  confess  I  find  it  depressing." 

"That's  because  you're  city-bred." 

"Well,  aren't  you?  No,  it's  not  that  at  all.  It's 
the  lack  of  life,  of  human  life.  This  is  a  place  for  old 
people  who've  done  with  life — it's  no  place  for  the 
young." 

"Nine-tenths  of  the  folk  here  are  young.  How  do 
you  account  for  that?" 

"They're  not  really  young.  They  haven't  the  sen- 
sations of  the  young.  They've  no  ambitions.  I  guess 
they've  buried  their  youth  in  their  orchards.  Think 
of  living  to  grow  strawberries  and  apples!  No  one 
who  is  really  young  could  do  that." 

She  laughed  scornfully.  I  liked  her  best  when  she 
laughed,  for  then  the  peevish  droop  of  her  lips  dis- 
appeared. 

"I  sometimes  think  I  could  be  content  with  such  a 
life,  nevertheless,"  I  said. 

"Then  you've  got  another  think  coming,"  she  said 
flippantly.  "O,  I  know  that  sort  of  feeling.  I  get  it 
every  summer:  it's  as  regular  as  hay- fever.  But  I 
know  it  doesn't  mean  anything  and  so  do  you." 

"You  think  I'm  insincere  then?" 

"Of  course  you  are.  That  is,  you're  sincere  in 
flashes,  but  in  the  bulk  you're  insincere.  We  can  both 
live  this  kind  of  life  for  a  month  or  two,  but  if  we 
had  to  live  it  always  we'd  as  soon  go  to  prison.  Shall 
I  tell  you  what  I've  found  out  about  these  Fruitvale 
women?     They  all  profess  to  think  their  lot  idyllic, 


36  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

but  there's  isn't  one  of  them  who  wouldn't  get  out  of 
it  to-morrow,  if  she  had  the  opportunity." 

"Your  friend,  Mrs.  Vernon?" 

"She  more  than  any  of  them.  The  poor  thing  is 
dying  to  get  bacl<  to  London.  Of  course  she  isn't 
going  to  say  so.  It's  the  Fruitvale  etiquette  for  every 
one  to  profess  absolute  contentment.  But  she  never 
plays  tennis  on  our  dusty  court  without  yearning  for 
those  green  tennis  lawns  you  have  in  England,  and 
when  the  spring  comes  she  cries  herself  to  sleep  be- 
cause she  can't  go  shopping  at  Peter  Robinson's." 

"Why,  what  a  discerning  little  creature  you  are! 
Are  you  quite  sure  you  don't  discern  what  doesn't 
exist?" 

"That  would  be  difficult,  wouldn't  it?  Except,  of 
course,  for  novelists — that's  their  business.  They  make 
a  point  of  seeing  the  thing  that  isn't,  and  they  very 
often  don't  see  the  thing  that  is." 

'T  wonder,"  I  said,  gazing  into  her  eyes.  She 
caught  my  meaning,  and  blushed. 

"Let  us  change  the  subject,"  she  said  composedly. 
*T  want  you  to  tell  me  about  your  friend  Mr.  Joddrel. 
What  does  he  mean  by  saying  there  is  going  to  be 
a  great  war?" 

"He  thinks  there  is,  and  he's  made  up  his  mind  to 
go.    That's  all  there  is  to  tell." 

"Then  I  suppose  he's  like  Mrs.  Vernon,  an  exile 
who  says  he's  contented  and  isn't " 

"O,  it  isn't  that  at  all,"  I  interrupted.  "Alan  has 
a  strong  sense  of  duty." 

"You  mean  a  strong  sense  of  life.    He  knows  very 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  37 

well  he  isn't  living.  He's  stuck  away  upon  some  dis- 
mal island,  isn't  he?  And  he  wants  to  get  back  into 
the  stream,  wants  to  get  away  from  the  dead  folk,  be- 
cause he's  got  some  spark  of  youth  not  yet  extin- 
guished in  him.  That's  why  I  liked  him.  He  had 
a  young  look  in  his  eyes.  He  looked  so  different 
from  the  Fruitvale  men.  They've  all  got  that  old  tired 
look — Button  particularly — but  Morrison,  and  Ver- 
non, and  all  of  them.  You've  only  to  watch  their  eyes 
to  recognise  it." 

"They've  all  got  it,  have  they  ?  You'll  be  telling  me 
next  that  I  have  it,  I  suppose." 

"No,  it's  only  incipient  in  you.  But  if  you  were  to 
stop  here  long  enough  you'd  get  it,  never  fear." 

"Really  this  is  most  interesting.  Would  you  kindly 
tell  me  just  what  this  Fruitvale  eye  looks  like?" 

"Like  the  eye  of  an  ox — flat,  dull,  opaque — O,  any- 
thing, you  like.  You  know  what  I  mean.  A  dog's 
eye  never  looks  like  that,  because  a  dog  is  the  most 
alive  of  all  creatures.  And  I  liked  Mr.  Joddrel  be- 
cause his  eye  was  alive — it  had  fire  in  it." 

She  laughed  at  the  conceit.  The  too  earnest  pur- 
suit of  metaphor  generally  ends  in  the  ridiculous. 

"Ox-eyed  Fruitvale,  I  must  remember  that,"  I  said. 

"Chewing  the  cud,"  she  added.  "The  cud  of  past 
hopes  and  ambitions,  because  there  are  no  present 
ones." 

"Are  you  ambitious,  Alice  ?" 

"H  I  were  a  man  I  should  be.  I  should  want  to  get 
everything  I  could  out  of  life." 

"Well,  women  are  ambitious  to  do  that." 


38  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Ah,  but  they  get  so  Httle.  Life  is  served  out  to 
them  in  such  small  cups." 

"If  you  were  a  man  you'd  do  as  Alan  is  going  to 
do,  go  to  the  war,  if  there  is  one,  eh?" 

"No,  I  hate  war.  It's  so  stupid.  Thank  God  Amer- 
ica is  out  of  all  that  kind  of  thing.  Let  the  crowned 
idiots  of  Europe  quarrel,  if  they  want  to.  It  doesn't 
concern  us." 

She  was  silent  a  few  moments,  and  then,  as  if  a  new 
thought  had  struck  her,  "You're  an  American,  aren't 
you?" 

"Certainly  I'm  not.  I  thought  you  knew  that.  I'm 
English." 

"But  you've  lived  in  New  York  for  years,  and  your 
books  are  published  there :  do  you  mean  to  say  you've 
never  become  a  citizen?" 

"I  not  only  have  not,  but  I  do  not  intend  to." 

"O,  please  pardon  me.  I  didn't  know.  And  I  had 
a  reason  for  asking." 

"Do  you  mind  telling  me  what  it  is?" 

"Not  now,"  she  said.  "Don't  you  think  we  had 
better  be  going  home." 

But  she  did  tell  me  after  all.  The  wind  had  fallen, 
as  it  usually  did  at  sunset,  and  the  lake  had  the  subtle 
colours  of  an  opal.  I  rowed  slowly  back,  reluctant  to 
lose  one  moment  of  the  evening  beauty.  A  warm  air 
from  the  sun-baked  rocks  came  in  long  draughts,  as 
though  the  world  breathed  softly  as  it  fell  into  sleep. 
Alice  lay  on  her  red  cushions,  very  silent  and  absorbed. 
The  dusk  closed  down  rapidly,  till  I  could  see  only  the 
pale  oval  of  her  face. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  39 

We  were  nearly  at  the  wharf  when  she  spoke. 

"There's  something  I  want  to  understand,"  she  said 
in  a  low  voice.  "Does  a  man  who  lives  in  one  country 
and  loves  another  really  belong  to  any  country?" 

"He  belongs  to  the  country  of  his  birth,"  I  answered. 

"Isn't  he  in  danger  of  becoming  a  man  without  a 
country  ?" 

"Why,  what  are  you  thinking  of,  Alice?" 

"I'm  thinking  of  Mr.  Joddrel.  I've  been  wondering 
if  you  are  like  him." 

Whether  she  spoke  in  irony  or  in  earnest  I  could 
not  tell,  for  it  was  too  dark  to  see  her  face,  and  she 
gave  me  no  chance  to  reply.  She  leapt  lightly  to  the 
wharf,  and  half  a  dozen  of  our  friends  drew  near, 
laughing  and  jesting,  I  had  no  doubt  at  my  expense. 
Fruitvale  is  like  all  the  rest  of  the  world  in  this  re- 
spect, that  its  women  dearly  love  to  see  love-making, 
and  are  keen  to  report  its  progress  and  its  prospects. 

I  said  good-night  to  her  at  the  end  of  the  wharf, 
and  walked  slowly  up  the  dark  path  to  my  little  house 
among  the  trees.  All  the  way  that  last  enigmatic  say- 
ing of  hers  was  in  my  ears,  and  I  began  to  understand 
that  she  had  told  me  something  which  she  hadn't 
meant  to  tell.  She  had  told  me  that  she  thought  of 
me,  and  whether  a  woman  thinks  ill  or  well  of  a  man, 
it  means  a  good  deal  that  she  should  think  of  him  at 
all.  A  woman  doesn't  think  about  a  man  in  whom 
she  is  not  interested.  Here  I  found  comfort,  but  in 
the  comparison  she  had  made  between  me  and  Alan  I 
found  something  inimical.  The  comparison  was  clearly 
not  to  my  advantage. 


40  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Woman's  unintelligible  inconsistency,"  I  reflected. 
"She  hates  war  and  admires  Alan  for  wishing  to  go 
to  war.  She  congratulates  herself  that  America  is 
immune  from  Old  World  political  convulsions,  and  is 
inclined  to  blame  me  because  I  profit  by  that  immunity. 
I  wonder  what  she  would  expect  me  to  do  if  war 
really  came?" 

"Well,  what  would  you  do?"  said  a  voice  within  me. 

And  at  that  I  laughed,  for  the  question  seemed  ab- 
surd. 

The  still  night  lay  round  me.  Mosquito-hawks  flew 
low,  an  owl  called  in  the  wood,  a  dog  barked  in  the 
distance.  The  solemn  hills  stood  around  in  a  great 
half-circle,  like  hooded  monks  in  silent  vespers.  The 
little  runnel  of  water  at  my  door  sang  a  song  of  peace. 
A  great  star  rested,  like  a  lamp,  on  the  shoulder  of  a 
hill  immediately  across  the  lake. 

Who  could  think  of  War  in  such  a  scene? 


V 

So  those  last  days  of  July,  1914,  found  me  peace- 
fully engaged  upon  a  new  book,  writing  each  morning 
in  the  little  verandah  of  the  shack,  boating  and  swim- 
ming in  the  afternoon,  conscious  of  a  new-born  vigour 
of  mind  and  body  that  had  come  to  me  in  this  holiday 
among  the  mountains.  Then  came  that  fateful  Sun- 
day, August  2nd,  when  Germany  declared  war  on 
Russia,  but  of  course  we  knew  nothing  of  it  in  our 
remote  solitude.  I  remember  thinking  that  very  morn- 
ing how  Fruitvale,  lying  in  the  pocket  of  the  moun- 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  41 

tains,  was  so  separate  from  the  world  that  the  world's 
doings  had  as  little  real  relation  to  its  life  as  the  trou- 
bles of  the  earth  might  have  to  a  soul  that  had  passed 
to  what  Defoe  finely  calls  "the  other  side  of  Time." 
The  conceit  pleased  me  so  much  that  I  tried  to  fashion 
it  into  a  poem,  one  verse  of  which  I  can  recall : — 

Here  shall  be  neither  haste  nor  heat. 
Nor  bitterness  of  struggle,  nor  the  wrong 
Man  works  on  man ;  only  the  quiet  beat 
Of  hushed  waves  murmuring  a  song, 
And  winds  that  weave  a  poet's  rhyme. 
In  this  still  place  where  sleep  is  very  sweet 
Upon  the  other  side  of  Time. 

"Not  so  bad,"  I  said.  "I'll  send  it  to  Maclean's 
Magazine,  and  call  it  'My  Hermitage.'  They'll  give 
me  fifty  dollars  for  it,  maybe." 

I  fell  to  thinking  how  big  fifty  dollars  looked  in 
Fruitvale,  and  how  little  in  New  York.  For  the  price 
of  a  dinner  at  the  Waldorf  a  man  might  live  a  week, 
or  even  more,  in  Fruitvale.  If  these  simple  folk 
knew  that  I  could  earn  fifty  dollars  by  an  hour's  pleas- 
ant work  with  pen  and  paper,  what  a  Croesus  they 
would  think  me!  Fifty  dollars  would  enable  Morri- 
son to  re-shingle  his  shack,  which  was  in  bad  repair; 
it  would  give  Mrs.  Vernon  the  new  dress  she  had 
dreamed  of  in  vain ;  it  would  be  the  enchanter's  wand, 
and  the  magic  carpet,  and  a  whole  Arabian  Nights' 
Entertainment.  No  doubt  to  these  simple  folk  I  must 
appear  a  kind  of  magician,  an  inscrutable  sort  of  fel- 
low, who  had  found  some  unlawful  means  of  turning 
the  lead  of  labour  into  fairy  gold.    Well,  so  I  had,  for 


42  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

I  perceived  this  quality  in  my  kind  of  work,  that  it 
was  work  which  was  the  real  deHghtful  expression  of 
myself,  whereas  the  work  of  most  men  was  the  ex- 
pression of  nothing  but  the  primitive  desire  to  earn 
one's  bread. 

And  then,  because  I  happened  to  put  my  hand  in 
my  pocket  and  drew  forth  Alan  Joddrel's  power  of 
attorney.  I  fell  to  thinking  of  him,  with  some  sym- 
pathy and  just  a  touch  of  half-amused  resentment. 
I  recalled  a  night  when  we  had  sat  together  in  a  hotel 
bedroom  at  Vancouver  and  he  had  detailed  to  me  his 
plans  and  hopes  with  such  fresh  boyish  glee  and  en- 
ergy of  expression  that  he  had  quite  captivated  me. 
He  had  told  me  something  of  his  life :  his  exodus  from 
England  against  the  counsel  of  his  parents,  his  arrival 
in  Canada  with  less  than  twenty  pounds  in  his  pocket, 
his  chance  choice  of  a  city — I  think  it  was  Calgary;  his 
fruitless  application  for  clerk's  work,  his  first  job  at 
digging  drains,  his  employment  as  surveyor's  assist- 
ant on  the  railway  without  the  smallest  knowledge  of 
surveying,  his  gradual  rise,  his  trip  through  a  wild 
country  of  great  natural  wealth,  his  discoveries  and 
his  adventures — the  common  idyll  of  the  great  Ca- 
nadian north-west,  but  to  me,  a  townsman,  unspeak- 
ably fresh  and  thrilling.  I  admired  him  for  being  so 
much  that  I  was  not  and  could  never  be,  and  from 
admiration  it  was  an  easy  step  to  trust.  We  became 
partners  that  night,  and  I  had  never  had  the  least 
cause  to  regret  my  faith  in  him.  And  now  he  was 
tacitly  breaking  his  partnership,  going  off  at  a  tangent, 
throwing  away  all  that  he  had  gained  with  so  much 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  43 

exertion,  and  it  didn't  seem  fair.  It  certainly  wasn't 
fair  to  his  wife  and  child. 

"But  there  won't  be  any  war  and  he  won't  go," 
I  said  to  myself.  "He's  an  adventurer  at  heart.  He 
scents  a  new  adventure — that  is  about  all  it  means; 
but  his  adventure  won't  materialise." 

My  reflections  were  interrupted  by  the  arrival  of 
Button.  It  seemed  that  late  on  Saturday  night  he 
had  started  the  idea  of  a  camping  party  and  had  found 
enthusiastic  support  among  his  friends.  The  plan 
was  to  take  two  pack-horses  and  two  tents,  with  the 
requisite  provisions,  and  go  back  into  the  mountains 
about  nine  miles  to  a  high  solitary  valley,  locally 
known  as  Silver  Lakes. 

"You'll  come,  of  course?"  he  said. 

"Who's  going?" 

"Ourselves  and  the  Vernons.  We've  asked  Miss 
Croxon,  of  course.  If  you  go,  that'll  make  the  party 
just  right.  We  three  men  will  have  one  tent,  and  the 
women  the  other.     It'll  be  great  fun." 

"Isn't  it  a  rather  hard  tramp  for  the  women?" 

I  had  Alice  Croxon  in  mind,  of  course.  I  won- 
dered how  a  New  York  girl  would  fare  on  such  a 
journey,  and  I  had  an  absurd  picture  in  my  mind  of 
Alice  in  thin  high-heeled  French  shoes  plodding  up 
a  road  that  rose  three  thousand  feet  in  six  miles,  and 
was  in  places  full  of  huge  boulders  washed  down  by 
the  spring  rains. 

"I  thought  of  that,"  he  replied  with  a  genial  grin, 
which  told  me  that  the  same  absurd  picture  was  in 
his  mind  too.    "Suppose  you  take  your  horse — then  the 


44  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

women  can  ride  in  turns.  I'm  afraid  we  haven't  a 
side-saddle  anywhere,  but  I  daresay  they  can  manage 
somehow."  • 

"It  sounds  dehghtful.  Of  course  I'll  come.  What 
are  your  plans?" 

"Well,  I  thought  we  might  start  between  two  and 
three  this  afternoon.  We  ought  to  get  there  about 
six.  That'll  give  us  nice  time  to  get  the  tents  up 
and  light  our  fires.  There's  lots  of  fish  in  the  lakes, 
and  we  can  get  some  for  supper.  I  did  think  of  put- 
ting it  off  till  the  middle  of  the  week,  but  this  weather 
is  too  good  to  miss.  If  the  weather  holds  we  can  stay 
there  two  or  three  days.  And,  by  the  bye,  take  plenty 
of  blankets.  It  can  be  awfully  cold  up  there  after 
sundown." 

"All  right.  I'll  be  ready  at  two.  Where  shall  we 
meet?" 

"At  the  store.  We'll  get  our  provisions  there,  and 
pack  the  horses.     We'll  have  a  great  time." 

He  went  down  the  wood-path  whistling  gaily — a 
trim  slight  figure  in  a  white  outing  shirt,  a  khaki  tie, 
and  tan  leggings. 

We  met  at  the  store  in  the  afternoon,  and  there  was 
the  usual  difficulty  in  getting  our  very  unworkmanlike 
packs  adjusted  to  the  horses.  If  there  is  any  animal 
more  sly  and  obstinate  than  a  British  Columbian  pack- 
horse,  I  do  not  know  him.  He  appears  almost  pa- 
thetic in  his  meekness  as  he  stands  patiently  with 
hanging  head,  but  in  reality  he  is  deeply  meditating 
schemes  for  the  defeat  and  humiliation  of  his  mas- 
ters.    There    is   an    unmistakable   gleam    of    amused 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  45 

malice  in  his  eye  as  he  contemplates  their  efforts  to 
bind  clumsy  loads  upon  his  back.  He  has  a  trick 
of  swelHng  himself  up  when  you  tighten  the  girths, 
and  immediately  releasing  his  breath  when  you  think 
you  have  succeeded  with  him,  with  the  result  that  the 
packs  fall  off  the  moment  he  moves.  When  this  hap- 
pens he  shakes  his  head  scornfully,  and  regards  you 
with  galling  pity.  You  try  again,  digging  your  foot 
into  his  belly,  and  straining  at  the  girth  till  it  seems 
it  must  break,  during  which  operation  ignorant  by- 
standers are  apt  to  mutter  strong  words  about  your 
brutality,  for  such  persons  always  take  sides  with  the 
horse,  and  this  incites  him  to  a  more  diabolic  ob- 
stinacy. All  these  things  happened  on  this  summer 
afternoon.  Old  Mrs.  Hales,  who,  previous  to  her 
arrival  at  Fruitvale,  had  always  lived  in  cities,  where 
she  was  a  peculiarly  diligent  member  of  the  Society 
for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to  Animals,  happened 
to  be  passing  on  her  way  to  Church,  and  stopped  to 
address  very  hurtful  remarks  to  Button,  who  at  that 
moment  was  delivering  a  vigorous  kick  at  the  rump 
of  his  horse;  and  Mrs.  Vernon,  with  a  pained  expres- 
sion on  her  pretty  face,  was  engaged  in  patting  one 
of  the  other  horses,  muttering,  "Poor  thing!"  But- 
ton had  lost  his  temper  and  was  red  in  the  face,  not 
only  with  his  exertions,  but  with  the  effort  to  sup- 
press the  swear  words  which  bubbled  to  his  lips.  Alice 
Croxon's  attitude  was  still  more  annoying  to  Button : 
she  clapped  her  hands  and  laughed  at  his  misfortune. 
"If  you  think  it's  easy,  come  and  try  yourself," 
he  said  viciously. 


46  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

I  don't  suppose  we  should  ever  have  started  unless 
Vernon  had  come  to  the  rescue.  Vernon  was  a  clerkly- 
looking  young  fellow,  in  a  worn  knickerbocker  suit  of 
faded  English  tweeds;  who,  in  spite  of  his  clerkliness, 
had  picked  up  a  good  deal  of  practical  efficiency  .dur- 
ing a  year  that  he  had  worked  among  the  silver  lead 
mines.  He  certainly  knew  the  wiles  of  pack-horses. 
The  horses  seemed  to  know  that  he  knew,  in  a  way 
that  horses  have,  and  recognised  the  unwisdom  of 
maintaining  the  struggle  as  soon  as  he  took  it  in  hand. 
In  the  end  he  succeeded  where  Button  had  failed. 
Button  thereupon  strode  ahead  in  a  palpable  bad  tem- 
per, and  we  all  got  away  about  three  o'clock,  just 
as  the  bell  in  the  little  Church  beside  the  lake  ceased 
ringing. 

Good  humour  soon  returned,  however,  as  we  left 
the  lake  and  began  to  climb  into  the  sanctuary  of  the 
hills.  The  road  was  rough  and  steep,  winding  through 
a  vast  forest,  and  the  air  was  exhilarating  with  the 
tonic  freshness  of  the  woods.  After  about  an  hour 
we  left  the  forest  and  came  out  upon  a  bare  stony 
shoulder  of  the  hill.  Far  below  a  stream,  with  the 
opaque  greenness  of  jade,  flowed  silently;  or  uttered 
a  small  voice  of  complaint  as  it  encountered  fallen  logs 
or  fell  in  a  miniature  cascade.  We  caught  our  last 
glimpse  of  the  lake,  blue  as  turquoise,  at  this  bend 
of  the  road.  We  were  soon  shut  in  again  by  walls 
of  forest,  now  walking  over  a  path  soft  with  moss 
and  disintegrated  pine-needles,  now  crossing  rude 
bridges  of  insecure  logs,  beneath  which  shrunken 
brooks  lay  in  glass-clear  pools.     In  the  heart  of  the 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  47 

forest  it  was  almost  dark,  and  the  air  was  damp.  The 
tamaracks  and  spruce  huddled  close  together:  only 
here  and  there  we  came  upon  an  open  space  where 
some  giant  cedar  had  fought  its  way  to  the  upper 
sunlight. 

No  words  can  describe  the  solemnity  of  these  dark 
corridors  of  forest  along  which  we  moved.  Our 
voices  grew  hushed;  gaiety  was  as  impertinent  here 
as  it  would  have  been  in  some  stately  mausoleum  or 
immemorial  temple.  And,  indeed,  it  was  death  we  saw 
on  all  sides.  Here  had  been  fought  Nature's  battle 
for  survival,  and  the  fallen  moss-grown  trunks,  that 
had  once  soared  a  hundred  feet  into  the  living  air,  lay 
everywhere  like  gigantic  corpses,  spotted  with  the  livid 
colours  of  decay.  And  then,  just  as  though  one  came 
out  of  the  mausoleum  into  a  lighted  Church,  bright 
v^ith  painted  windows,  we  emerged  from  these  dark 
recesses  of  the  forest  into  tiny  open  glades,  full  of 
sunshine,  where  heavenly  choirs  might  have  been  glad 
to  sing.  In  these  green  spaces  there  was  indeed  some- 
thing that  resembled  singing,  the  going  of  the  wind 
in  the  tree-tops,  a  long  pleasant  murmur  of  soft  sound 
— something  not  heard  in  the  depth  of  the  wood,  where 
the  silence  lay  like  a  weight,  producing  the  effect  of 
final  immobility.  And,  to  complete  the  illusion,  there 
was  a  strangely  pungent  perfume  too,  as  if  censers 
had  been  swung  there  just  before  we  came,  and  the 
noiseless  acolytes  had  vanished  in  the  very  moment  of 
our  undesired  intrusion. 

There  was  very  little  conversation  on  our  journey; 
our  energies  were  too  completely  engaged  in  nego- 


48  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

tiating  the  difficulties  of  the  trail.  When  we  were 
not  passing  through  actual  forest  or  moving  cautiously 
round  the  shoulders  of  bare  hills,  where  the  trail  was 
scarcely  two  feet  wide,  we  rode  through  heavy  grass 
which  rose  as  high  as  the  bridles  of  the  horses.  Here 
the  trail  was  particularly  treacherous,  nothing  more 
than  a  broken  corduroy  road  of  slippery  logs  between 
which  the  swamp  water  oozed.  There  was  nowhere 
any  sign  of  man.  Once  only  we  came  upon  a  ruined 
hut,  where  the  wood-cutters  had  lived  in  winter,  and 
round  which  lay  the  half-cut  logs  that  witnessed  their 
former  energy.  These  signs  of  human  dereliction 
added  a  note  of  pathos  to  the  scene.  Man  and  all  his 
puny  labours  appeared  ironically  insignificant  against 
this  background  of  secular  antiquity.  From  these  vir- 
ginal silences  came  the  quiet  voice  of  mockery  which 
proclaimed  all  the  struggles  of  man  but  "a  trouble  of 
ants  in  the  light  of  a  million  million  suns."  The  de- 
serted hut  witnessed  the  perpetual  defeat  of  man  at 
the  hands  of  Nature  which  he  vainly  asserts  that  he 
has  conquered;  it  was  as  poignant  an  evidence  of  the 
vanity  of  human  efifort  as  the  fallen  walls  of  Baalbec 
or  Palmyra  in  the  wilderness. 

Something  of  this  we  all  felt,  and  perhaps  our  si- 
lence was  in  part  an  instinctive  acquiescence  in  these 
grave  emotions.  In  these  new  lands  the  wilderness 
is  so  immense  and  man's  encroachment  on  it  so  slight, 
that  all  the  truly  heroic  toils  of  man  seem  forgotten 
in  the  relative  futility  of  his  exertions.  He  comes 
and  goes,  but  the  earth  abides  forever.  Let  him  stay 
his  hand  but  for  a  moment  and  the  wilderness  rushes 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  49 

in  and  obliterates  his  work.  Let  him  withdraw  for 
but  a  trivial  decade,  for  half  a  dozen  years  or  even 
for  a  single  year,  and  the  house  which  he  has  built 
amid  its  fruitful  orchard  would  become  even  as  this 
wood-cutter's  hut  with  its  sagging  roof,  its  grass- 
grown  threshold,  and  its  rubbish  heap  of  rusty  pails 
and  broken  implements  around  the  door. 

We  rested  for  a  few  minutes  at  the  hut.  A  little 
spring  at  the  back  of  the  hut  bubbled  into  an  earthen 
pan;  a  bluebird  flashed  among  the  trees,  and  some- 
where, near  at  hand  but  hidden,  a  woodpecker  tapped 
incessantly.  These  tiny  sounds  gave  edge  to  the  im- 
mense silence.  It  was  a  place  exactly  fitted  for  the 
pulpit  of  that  Ancient  Wisdom  which  proclaimed, 
"What  doth  our  arrogancy  profit  us?  What  good 
have  riches  and  vaunting  brought  us?  These  things 
all  pass  as  a  shadow;  as  a  ship  passing  through  the 
billowing  water,  whereof,  when  it  is  gone  by,  there 
is  no  trace  to  be  found,  neither  pathway  of  its  keel 
in  the  billows;  or  as  when  a  bird  flieth  through  the 
air,  no  token  of  her  passage  is  found,  but  the  light 
wind,  lashed  with  the  stroke  of  her  pinions,  and  rent 
asunder  with  the  violent  rush  of  her  moving  wings; 
or  as  when  an  arrow  is  shot  at  a  mark,  the  air,  dis- 
persed, closeth  up  again  immediately,  so  that  mankind 
knoweth  not  where  it  passed  through:  so,  we  also, 
as  soon  as  we  are  born,  cease  to  be." 

It  was  Alice  Croxon  who  spoke  for  all  of  us  when 
she  said,  "Come  away.  There's  something  eerie 
here." 

So  we  went  on,  and  in  another  half-hour  found 


50  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ourselves  in  an  open  valley.  The  forests  fell  away, 
like  curtains  withdrawn.  A  bright  stream  ran  beside 
the  trail,  and  ahead  of  us  three  small  lakes  sparkled. 
The  sun  had  already  sunk  behind  the  western  hills, 
but  its  warm  glow  still  lay  upon  the  water.  Vast 
puq)le  shadows  steeped  the  gorges  on  the  mountain- 
side. Overhead  the  sky  was  a  sea  of  rose,  cloud- 
less, with  long  up-flung  streamers  of  pure  light  that 
in  the  zenith  thinned  out  into  arrowy  flame. 

Our  spirits  were  suddenly  released  from  the  op- 
pression of  the  woods.  We  had  come  upon  a  home- 
like place,  an  open-air  house,  a  chamber  where  great 
draughts  of  air  moved  softly,  promising  rest  and 
wholesome  sleep. 

"Here's  the  camp,"  cried  Button,  gleefully,  point- 
ing to  a  cleared  space  beside  the  water,  where  half 
a  dozen  great  stones  piled  together  held  the  wood-ash 
of  former  fires. 

And  it  was  with  answering  light-heartedness  we  be- 
gan to  unload  the  wearied  horses,  and  went  about  the 
business  of  pitching  our  two  tents  in  the  wilderness. 


VI 

We  soon  had  a  bright  fire  blazing  and  a  kettle  boil- 
ing. The  tents  were  pitched  on  a  little  grassy  bank, 
within  three  or  four  yards  of  the  fire.  Our  next  task 
was  to  cut  tender  tassels  of  sweet  smelling  balsam 
for  our  beds.  In  this  task  I  did  not  distinguish  my- 
self,  for  I  had  no  knowledge  of  trees,  and  in  my 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  51 

ignorance  supposed  that  any  kind  of  young  bough 
would  serve. 

"Remember  you  have  to  sleep  on  them,"  said  Ver- 
non, with  a  smile  at  my  incompetence.  "You'd  better 
let  me  do  this.  Why  don't  you  go  and  fish  while  I 
do  it?" 

"Yes,  let's  fish,"  cried  Mrs.  Button.  "It's  capital 
sport.  We  have  an  hour  or  so  of  good  light,  and 
these  lakes  simply  swarm  with  fish." 

So  we  went  fishing,  while  Button  and  Vernon  un- 
dertook to  get  the  camp  properly  ordered  in  our  ab- 
sence. We  walked  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  through 
the  thick  grass,  already  damp  with  the  dew,  to  the 
furthest  of  the  three  tiny  lakes. 

"And  now  we  must  find  a  raft,"  said  Mrs.  Vernon. 

It  appeared  that  what  she  meant  by  a  raft  was 
half  a  dozen  small  logs  nailed  together  by  two  cross- 
bars. A  few  years  before  there  had  been  a  lum- 
ber camp  on  this  lake,  and  these  rafts  were  the 
primitive  contrivances  which  the  lumbermen  had  used 
in  their  fishing.  After  a  brief  search  we  found  one 
stranded  in  a  little  sandy  bay.  It  was  just  big  enough 
for  the  four  of  us  to  stand  upon. 

"It  looks  rather  precarious,"  I  remarked. 

"Of  course  it  is.  That's  the  fun  of  it,"  laughed 
Mrs.  Vernon.  "We're  pretty  sure  to  fall  off,  you 
know." 

I  looked  apprehensively  at  Alice.  She  caught  my 
glance  and  smiled.  If  she  felt  any  fear,  she  certainly 
did  not  show  it.  She  had  evidently  made  her  mind 
up  to  go  through  with  the  adventure,  and  I  recollected 


52  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

my  absurd  notion  that  she  would  wear  thin  French 
shoes,  which  had  certainly  proved  quite  baseless.  She 
wore  a  short  dress  of  grey  homespun  and  thick  laced 
boots.  She  had  ridden  astride  in  turn  with  the  other 
women,  and  had  shown  no  sign  of  fatigue.  I  began 
to  perceive  a  new  Alice  who  had  eluded  my  analysis — 
a  primitive  woman,  at  heart  unspoiled  by  cities,  and 
I  wondered  whether  in  that  mixed  American  blood 
of  hers  there  might  not  be  some  virile  drops  inherited 
from  pioneering  ancestors. 

She  was  tlie  first  to  step  upon  our  precarious  raft. 
Mrs.  Vernon,  to  whom  the  situation  was  not  novel, 
became  the  mistress  of  the  raft. 

"Mrs.  Button  and  I  will  sit  down  in  the  middle : 
Alice  can  stand  in  front,  and  you  can  paddle  at  the 
back,"  were  her  orders. 

We  pushed  off  from  the  shore,  and  were  afloat  upon 
the  silent  lake.  In  the  immensity  of  this  mountain 
scenery  the  lake  was  a  mere  cupful  of  water,  very 
clear  and  still.  All  around  rose  the  pathless  woods, 
sloping  down  steeply  to  the  lake,  till,  in  the  evening 
half-light,  it  was  difficult  to  distinguish  where  the 
trees  ended  and  the  lake  began.  The  whole  mountain- 
side hung  suspended  in  the  water,  so  that  we  appeared 
to  be  floating  on  the  tree-tops  of  a  dark  submerged 
world.  At  one  point  there  rose  a  grey  bastion  of  rock, 
beneath  which  the  water  lay  deep  and  black,  and  it  was 
toward  this  point  I  steered  the  raft. 

Mrs.  Button  was  perfectly  correct  when  she  stated 
that  the  lake  swarmed  with  fish.  The  trout  rose  so 
fast,  bit  so  eagerly,  and  made  so  poor  a  fight  that 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  53 

there  was  little  sport  in  catching  them.  They  had 
been  left  alone  so  long  that  they  were  totally  unac- 
quainted with  the  craft  of  man.  It  was  more  like 
a  wholesale  massacre  of  the  innocents  than  sport.  In 
a  very  short  time  we  had  a  dozen  beauties,  quite  as 
many  as  were  needed  for  our  supper.  But  we  did 
not  escape  without  the  ducking  that  Mrs.  Vernon 
prophesied.  In  landing  a  two-pounder  Alice  lost  her 
balance,  the  raft  gently  tilted,  and  Mrs.  Vernon 
slipped  after  her  into  the  lake.  Since  it  was  impos- 
sible for  them  to  climb  back  upon  the  raft,  there  was 
nothing  for  it  but  that  they  should  swim  ashore,  which 
they  did  with  much  laughter  and  excitement.  I  fol- 
lowed them,  paddling  the  raft  with  Mrs.  Dutton,  each 
of  us  pretty  nearly  as  wet  as  though  we  also  had 
been  in  the  water. 

"Thank  heaven,  I've  brought  some  other  clothes," 
said  Mrs.  Dutton  gaily.  "If  we  come  here  fishing  to- 
morrow, I  vote  we  wear  our  bathing  suits." 

Fortunately  the  water  was  not  cold.  It  was  al- 
most tepid,  for  there  was  little  current  and  it  had 
been  warmed  by  a  long  day  of  strong  sunshine.  It 
was  nearly  dark  when  we  reached  the  shore.  A  few 
stars  were  in  the  sky,  a  wonderful  clearness  hung 
over  the  west,  but  elsewhere  the  soft  gloom  rested  like 
a  pall  of  velvet.  Further  down  the  valley  shone  the 
camp-fire,  and  we  heard  the  voices  of  Dutton  and 
Vernon,  the  dull  thud  of  the  mallet  driving  home  the 
tent  pegs  and  the  sharp  strokes  of  an  axe  splitting  fire- 
wood. 

That  supper  round  the  camp-fire  was  a  thing  unique 


54  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

in  my  experience.  I  had  the  pleasant  sense  of  reahs- 
ing  by  a  sort  of  miracle  the  Crusoe-dreams  of  child- 
hood. To  be  sitting  round  a  camp-fire  in  the  wilder- 
ness, with  no  human  creature  but  ourselves  within 
half  a  score  of  miles,  thrilled  me.  That  old  life  of 
shouting  streets,  hurried  engagements,  fevered  ambi- 
tions, seemed  not  only  far  away  but  wholly  unthink- 
able. The  primitive  man  arose  in  me,  the  man  of 
whose  existence  I  had  been  unaware.  I  saw  myself 
humbly  following  in  the  long  procession  of  man's 
immemorial  life  upon  the  earth,  which  had  existed 
before  the  birth  of  cities  and  perhaps  would  survive 
them;  and  I  ceased  to  wonder  that  the  oldest  wisdom 
of  the  world  was  born  in  the  hearts  of  men  who  dwelt 
in  tents. 

We  sat  long  round  the  fire,  sung  in  chorus  old  songs, 
talked  of  old  memories.  They  were  memories  of 
England  chiefly;  I  suppose  it  was  the  sharp  contrast 
of  the  scene  which  evoked  them.  Vernon  spoke  with 
aflFection  of  the  view  of  misty  violet  distances  from 
Hampstead  Heath,  and  Dutton  of  the  splashing  weir 
at  Great  Marlow,  and  I  of  boyish  tramps  through  Ep- 
ping  Forest.  It  seemed  we  had  all  lived  pretty  close 
to  one  another  in  London  without  knowing  it.  Dut- 
ton had  been  educated  at  St.  Paul's,  and  Vernon  at 
the  Merchant  Tailors,  and  I  at  Highgate.  We  had 
perhaps  passed  one  another  in  the  streets,  and  cer- 
tainly had  sat  not  far  from  one  another  at  the  Christ- 
mas pantomime  at  Drury  Lane,  for  we  each  recalled 
the  quips  and  jests  of   Herbert  Campbell  and  Dan 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  55 

Leno.    And  here  we  were,  flung  out  by  various  fates, 
gathered  round  a  fire  in  the  wilderness! 

The  thought  brought  with  it  a  more  real  sense  of 
comradeship  than  I  had  yet  felt.  I  remembered,  with 
some  compunction,  that  I  had  been  quick  to  observe 
Button's  indolence,  and  Vernon's  rather  laboured 
suavity — all  I  remembered  now  was  that  we  were  of 
the  same  stock,  and  had  been  nursed  upon  the  breasts 
of  the  same  great  mother.  And  the  same  emotion 
seized  on  me  as  I  looked  on  Mrs.  Button,  with  her 
childlike  daintiness,  and  Mrs.  Vernon  with  her  air 
of  London  pertness,  her  Bresden-china  prettiness.  I 
saw  now  that  there  must  be  some  harder  fibre  in  them 
both,  some  underlying  strength,  which  enabled  them 
to  make  a  jest  of  a  life  which  involved  so  many  so- 
cial deprivations;  for  were  not  they  also  daughters 
of  the  same  great  Mother,  who  flung  her  children  forth 
into  so  many  strange  paths  and  places,  because  she 
had  such  superb  faith  in  their  inherent  courage  ?  Alice 
Croxon  had  no  precise  place  in  these  thoughts;  yet 
she  too  had  an  English  name,  and  a  long  way  back 
— I  knew  not  how  far — there  must  have  been  a  Croxon 
who  crossed  the  grey  Atlantic,  and  perhaps  carved  his 
new  home  out  of  just  such  a  wilderness  as  this.  At 
all  events  it  pleased  me  to  think  this,  and  some  day, 
if  chance  favoured  me,  I  thought  that  I  would  ask 
her  about  it.  So  something  like  a  real  fellowship 
sprang  up  between  us  as  we  sat  round  the  fire  that 
night.  It  was  the  product  of  our  complete  isola- 
tion from  all  other  human  creatures.  The  silence, 
the  dark  woods  and  the  vast  night  pressed  against 


56  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

us,  drove  us  close  together,  making  the  hour  sacra- 
mental. 

About  ten  o'clock  the  air  grew  very  cold,  and  the 
stars  glittered  with  a  wintry  keenness.  We  were  glad 
to  crawl  into  our  tents,  where  I  made  acquaintance 
with  the  extreme  knobbliness  of  a  bed  which  consisted 
of  a  horse-rug  spread  over  a  thin  layer  of  balsam 
boughs.  Sleep  was  impossible,  not  only  by  reason  of 
the  roughness  of  our  bed,  but  because  of  the  cold 
that  grew  more  and  more  searching  as  the  night  went 
on.  My  wet  feet  added  to  my  discomfort,  and  I  had 
an  amused  vision  of  the  horror  with  which  my  circum- 
stances would  have  been  regarded  by  those  tender 
guardians  of  my  boyhood,  to  whom  the  least  damp- 
ness in  my  socks  was  a  catastrophe,  calling  for  hot 
mustard  baths  and  camphor.  From  the  women's  tent 
a  few  yards  from  our  own,  came  laughter  and  gay 
voices. 

"How  are  you  getting  on?"  we  shouted. 

"Splendidly,"  Mrs.  Vernon  called  back.  "Only 
Alice  has  just  discovered  the  wood-axe  underneath 
her  head,  and  I  believe  there's  a  pack-rat  running 
round." 

"Why  don't  you  call  it  a  coyote,"  answered  Vernon, 
"or  a  bear — that  would  be  still  more  dramatic?" 

"Well,  it's  something  alive,  anyhow." 

"All  right,  I'll  come  and  see,"  said  Vernon. 

"That  you  won't.  We're  only  fooling,"  said  Mrs. 
Vernon  indignantly. 

The  voices  ceased  with  surprising  suddenness. 

"Are  there  pack-rats  here?"  I  asked. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  57 

"Very  likely,"  said  Vernon.  "But  they  a-re  quite 
harmless.  They're  jovial  little  sports,  who  spend  the 
time  carrying  things  from  one  place  to  another,  and 
then  carrying  them  back  again." 

"Like  humans,"  said  Button.  "Don't  we  also  run 
round  and  round  and  get  nowhere  too?" 

"What's  the  matter — uncomfortable?"  said  Vernon. 

"No,  I'm  only  thinking,  and  I  hate  thinking  in  the 
dark,  because  I  always  think  of  the  things  I  least 
want  to  think  of.  That's  why  I  always  read  myself 
to  sleep,  and  read  the  moment  I  wake  up,  too." 

"I've  had  that  experience,"  I  said.  "I  wonder  why 
it  is  that  if  you  can't  sleep  you  always  think  of  all 
the  unhappy  things  that  have  ever  happened  to  you 
— never  of  the  happy  ones?" 

"Suppose  we  tell  each  other  just  what  we're  think- 
ing of,"  said  Vernon.  "It  will  help  to  pass  the  time. 
You  begin.  Waller." 

"O,  I  was  thinking  of  an  old  inn  at  Ludlow  where 
I  once  stayed,"  I  answered.  "It  had  the  biggest  and 
the  softest  bed  I  ever  slept  on.  The  rooms  were  all 
oak-panelled,  and  the  front  of  the  house  was  a  mass 
of  carved  oak,  and  the  dining  room  had  the  royal  arms 
above  a  wide  stone  chimney-place.  I  fell  asleep  won- 
dering if  Milton  had  slept  in  that  bed  when  he  came 
down  to  Ludlow  to  see  his  Comus  played  in  the  Castle. 
I  imagine  that  it  was  the  contrast  between  that  wide 
four-post  bed  and  this  misdemeanour  of  a  bed  that 
recalled  the  memory." 

"Which  disproves  your  theory  that  when  you  can't 
sleep  you  think  only  of  unhappy  things,"  said  Vernon, 


58  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Now  I  was  thinking  of  a  school  I  went  to  when  I 
was  a  kid,  where,  if  your  nails  were  black  or  you 
hadn't  washed  behind  your  ears,  they  decorated  you 
with  a  card  engraved  with  the  word  DIRTY,  which 
they  hung  round  your  neck,  and  you  had  to  wear  it 
all  day,  and  when  you  went  into  the  playground  the 
boys  flung  stones  at  you.  It's  queer,  but  I've  never 
got  over  the  shame  of  that  experience,  and  I  can  still 
feel  my  face  flush  at  its  recollection.  I  suppose  I 
thought  of  that  just  now  because  I'm  undoubtedly 
grubby  and  very  much  in  need  of  washing.  Now 
it's  your  turn.  Button.  What  unhappy  thing  are  you 
thinking  of?" 

"The  South  African  veldt,"  he  replied.  "There's 
a  bitter  wind  that  blows  there  at  night,  even  after 
the  hottest  day.    Well,  there  was  a  night " 

He  stopped  suddenly. 

"Another  instance  of  association,"  I  said.  "This 
bitter  cold  made  you  think  of  that,  eh?" 

He  sat  up,  leaning  on  his  elbow. 

"No,  it  wasn't  that,"  he  said.  "I  don't  know  why 
I  should  tell  you  what  it  was,  but  perhaps  you'll  un- 
derstand, and  never  mention  it.  It  was  in  the  Boer 
War.  I  went  out  with  the  C.I.V.'s,  without  the  least 
idea  of  what  I  was  going  to.  It's  a  God-forsaken  land 
and  I  hated  it  from  the  first.  It's  all  dust  and  rocks, 
and  the  Boers  popped  at  you  behind  the  rocks  with- 
out giving  you  a  chance.  This  eternal  secrecy  of  their 
attack  wore  my  nerves  down,  and  what  with  the  hard 
marching  and  the  bad  water  I  came  very  near  enteric. 
Well,  one  evening,  when  I  was  at  my  worst,  scarcely 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  59 

able  to  sit  my  horse,  we  were  suddenly  attacked.  Be- 
fore I  knew  what  I  was  doing  I  was  riding  madly 
across  the  veldt,  not  noticing  where  I  was  going.  The 
sun  went  down,  and  in  a  few  minutes  it  was  dark.  My 
horse  fell.  I  had  just  time  to  save  myself.  I  think 
I  fainted.  At  all  events  when  I  recovered  conscious- 
ness I  found  myself  lying  on  the  open  veldt,  quite 
alone,  with  a  freezing  wind  searching  through  my  thin 
khaki.  I  sat  up.  The  world  was  empty  of  all  life, 
and  suddenly  it  came  to  me  that  I  had  lost  my  com- 
pany. I  had  run  away.  I  had  run  away — the  words 
thundered  through  my  brain.  The  stars  knew  all 
about  it — they  twinkled  maliciously,  like  eyes  that 
mocked  me.  Every  one  would  know  it  soon.  My 
folk  in  England  would  know  it.  I  had  run  away. 
Well,  that  was  the  bitterest  moment  of  my  life:  and 
it  all  comes  back  to  me  when  I  can't  sleep.  That's 
why  I  always  read  myself  to  sleep:  I  know  if  I  don't 
that  I  shall  be  re-living  to  its  last  detail  that  awful 
night  upon  the  veldt." 

"Well,"  said  Vernon,  "I  don't  see  why  that  should 
trouble  you  so  much.  I  guess  either  of  us  would  have 
done  the  same" — and  from  my  heart  I  thanked  the 
good  simple  fellow  for  his  genial  wisdom.  The  Lon- 
don clerk,  whose  most  shameful  memory  was  of  a 
school  humiliation  long  ago,  had  contrived  to  say  the 
healing  word  which  I  had  not  the  wit  to  utter. 

"Do  you  think  so"  said  Button  with  the  eagerness 
of  a  reprimanded  boy  who  looks  doubtfully  into  the 
face  of  his  censor,  searching  it  for  some  gleam  of  sym- 
pathy and  understanding. 


6o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I'm  sure  of  it,"  said  Vernon. 

"And  I,  too,"  I  said. 

"Well,  that's  a  great  comfort  to  me.  You're  good 
fellows  to  say  it,  and  I  only  hope  you  mean  it." 

He  lay  down  again  and  was  soon  asleep. 

But  for  me  sleep  came  slowly.  I  knew  now  the 
secret  of  that  old  look  on  Dutton's  face,  so  tragically 
at  variance  with  his  boyish  manners.  An  Inquisition 
was  silently  set  up  in  my  own  soul,  and  I  tortured 
myself  with  hypothetical  dilemmas,  of  how  I  might 
or  might  not  behave  in  conditions  that  demanded  sud- 
den courage.  I  slept  at  last,  but  in  an  uneasy  fashion. 
The  biting  cold  pierced  the  tent  walls.  Above  my  head 
there  was  a  long  rent  in  the  canvas,  through  which 
I  saw  a  star  that  shone  with  a  bluish  splendour.  To- 
ward four  o'clock  I  woke  and  could  sleep  no  more. 
I  slipped  out  of  the  tent  into  the  chill  morning  air, 
A  white  mist  lay  along  the  river  and  the  trees  were 
gemmed  with  moisture.  I  gathered  fir-cones  and 
pieces  of  old  packing-cases,  lit  a  fire  and  filled  my  ket- 
tle at  the  river. 

As  I  came  back  from  the  river  the  flap  of  the 
women's  tent  was  raised  and  Alice  came  out. 

"I  want  some  tea,"  she  said  plaintively. 

"You  shall  have  it  in  ten  minutes,"  I  replied. 

"Good,"  she  said,  rubbing  her  chilled  hands  like  an 
unhappy  child. 

The  deep  shadows  still  lay  upon  the  Silver  Lakes. 
There  was  no  sound  but  the  quiet  ripple  of  the  stream 
over  its  rocky  bed.  But  already  the  magic  of  the 
dawn  was  working;  the  stars  were  paling,  and  from 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  6i 

the  east  a  pure  white  radiance  of  essential  hght  was 
flung  up  into  the  cloudless  sky,  and  opened  slowly  out- 
ward like  a  fan. 


VII 


There  is  a  singular  intimacy  in  a  meal  shared  by 
two  persons  in  a  solitary  world.  The  fire,  fed  with 
fir-cones,  soon  burned  with  a  clear  brightness,  the  ket- 
tle sang,  and  the  tea  was  made.  The  stillness  of  the 
world  was  so  intense  that  we  found  ourselves  speak- 
ing in  whispers.  No  sound  of  life  came  from  the  two 
tents.  We  were  as  much  alone  as  Adam  and  Eve  in 
Eden,  and  we  were  as  shyly  conscious  of  each  other  as 
two  children  deserted  by  their  elders. 

"Shall  we  wake  the  others,  and  give  them  some 
tea"  I  asked. 

She  shook  her  head. 

"I  don't  think  they'd  be  grateful,"  she  added  with 
a  smile. 

"What  do  you  say  to  a  swim?" 

"Yes,  I  should  like  that." 

We  found  our  bathing  suits  in  one  of  the  packs,  and 
took  the  path  that  led  to  the  lakes.  Beside  a  broken 
weir,  through  which  the  water  spouted  into  a  crystal 
pool,  I  left  her  to  undress ;  I  went  further  on  into  the 
wood.  When  I  came  out  of  the  wood  I  saw  her  stand- 
ing on  the  runway  of  the  weir,  her  hands  lifted  for 
the  dive.  From  the  lake  a  white  mist  was  rising, 
blown  softly  to  and  fro  like  a  muslin  curtain  by  the 
breath   of   dawn.      She   looked   curiously   slight  and 


62  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

small,  a  kind  of  elfin  child,  with  the  mist  round  her 
feet  like  a  white  discarded  garment.  When  she  dived 
it  was  as  though  the  mist  swallowed  her  up.  I  swam 
out  into  the  lake  to  meet  her,  guided  by  the  sound 
of  her  movement,  and  the  ripples  on  the  water.  We 
met  in  the  middle  of  the  lake,  and  swam  silently  side 
by  side.  \\'e  had  often  done  this  when  bathing  at 
Fruitvale,  but  always  with  a  good  deal  of  merry  laugh- 
ter; the  strange  thing  in  this  swim  was  our  silence. 
The  word  she  had  used  about  the  heavy  stillness  of 
the  woods  recurred  to  me — it  was  "eerie."  This  was 
also  "eerie."  There  was  a  sense  of  unseen  eyes  that 
watched  us  from  the  shores,  of  a  mysterious  isolation 
from  all  human  life,  but  of  closeness  to  other  forms 
of  life  which  were  not  discerned.  And  it  was  eerie, 
too,  to  find  ourselves  in  little  open  spaces  of  dark 
water  shut  in  by  these  moving  walls  of  mist,  or  to 
pass  through  the  yielding  walls,  with  the  friendly  shore 
quite  hidden,  as  if  we  had  lost  the  solid  habitable 
world,  and  were  alone  in  the  vacant  infinite.  I  felt  as 
though  anything  strange  or  supernatural  might  hap- 
pen in  such  a  scene  at  such  an  hour — the  rising  from 
the  water  of  a  white  arm  that  waved  the  magic  sword 
Excalibur,  or  the  sudden  passage  of  King  Arthur's 
funeral  barge,  with  men  in  armour  rusted  by  the  dew, 
and  wailing  trumpets  uttering  farewells. 

The  spell  was  broken  by  the  rising  of  the  sun. 
Through  a  gap  in  the  mountains  rushed  the  golden 
flood  of  dawn,  and  a  long  level  lane  of  light  was  drawn 
across  the  lake.  We  swam  into  it,  as  into  a  lighted 
river.      The    mists    disappeared    instantaneously.      A 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  63 

heavy  sigh  ran  through  the  woods,  as  of  a  sleeper 
who  awakes,  and  a  fresh  breeze  began  to  blow.  A  new 
day  was  born  and  Time  saluted  it  with  precious  gifts 
of  gold  and  frankincense,  the  gold  of  living  light  and 
the  wind-blown  fragrance  of  the  kneeling  forests. 

We  dressed  rapidly,  and  then  sat  a  long  while  on 
the  broken  weir,  listening  to  the  splashing  of  the 
water  as  it  fell  into  the  pool.  After  a  time  we  began 
to  talk,  but  still  in  low  voices,  as  if  we  feared  to  awake 
some  one.  But  our  talk  was  restrained  by  that  curi- 
ous shyness  which  had  grown  up  between  us.  Once 
only  our  thoughts  moved  freely.  I  had  said  some- 
thing about  it  being  good  to  be  alive,  when  Alice  sur- 
prised me  by  replying,  "Extreme  joy  always  makes  me 
melancholy." 

"But  why?" 

"With  the  feaT  that  it  can't  last." 

"Isn't  that  a  very  foolish  fear?" 

"Yes,  I  suppose  it  is.  All  fear  is  foolish,  for  that 
matter,  because  it  doesn't  alter  anything.  But  I've 
never  yet  had  a  specially  good  time  without  making 
myself  miserable  with  the  idea  that  I'd  have  to  pay 
for  it  some  day.  When  I  had  birthdays  as  a  child 
I  always  dreaded  them,  because  I  knew  how  flat  and 
dull  the  day  after  the  birthday  would  be." 

"What  an  unhappy  child  you  must  have  been!" 

"No,  not  unhappy,  but  only  apprehensive.  I  can 
never  quite  enjoy  to-day  because  I'm  apprehensive  of 
to-morrow." 

"And  are  you  still  apprehensive  in  that  way?" 
'Very  often." 


«! 


64  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

She  looked  at  me  shyly,  as  if  afraid  that  she  had 
said  too  much.  And,  as  I  looked  back  into  her  face, 
I  understood  that  downward  droop  of  the  lips,  which 
made  her  appear  discontented.  "Poor  child;  she 
also."  I  thought,  "is  suffering  from  the  malady  of  the 
age — the  fear  born  out  of  too  much  ease,  the  anemia 

of  a  life  that  has  lost  its  edge,  its  natural  daring " 

I  laid  my  hand  on  her  cool  hand  and  said,  "But  didn't 
life  feel  good  when  we  were  swimming?  And  can't 
you  just  take  this  glorious  day  for  yours,  and  live  it 
joyously?" 

"I'll  try,"  she  said.  And  then,  with  a  smile,  "Of 
course,  I  will.  And  to  begin  with,  I'm  ferociously 
hungry,  and  I'm  sure  it's  time  for  breakfast.  I'm 
like  that  man  in  the  Bible  who  sold  his  birthright  for 
a  mess  of  pottage,  and  I  can't  say  I  blame  him.  Won't 
you  please  find  a  mess  of  pottage  for  me?" 

We  rose  and  strolled  slowly  back  to  the  camp.  The 
tents  still  showed  no  signs  of  life.  A  thin  spiral  of 
smoke  rose  from  the  fire,  spreading  itself  out  into  a 
tiny  cloud  which  was  caught  like  a  veil  of  gossamer  in 
the  dew-spangled  branches  of  the  fir-trees.  A  gopher 
sat  on  a  flat  rock  beside  the  river  contemplating  us 
with  his  inimitable  air  of  timid  curiosity. 

"Suppose  we  get  breakfast  ready,  just  to  surprise 
the  others,"  I  said. 

"Yes.  Let's  do  it.  It'll  be  great  fun.  Only  you 
must  know  I  never  cooked  anything  in  my  life." 

"I'll  teach  you.     It's  time  you  learned." 

"Thank   you,"   she  said   with   a  mocking  curtsey. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  65 

"I'll  call  you  Sir  Gareth.    Let  me  see,  how  do  the  lines 


run 


? 


'So  Gareth  all  for  glory  underwent 
The  sooty  yoke  of  kitchen-vassalage.*" 

"And  you  shall  be  Lynette. 

'A  damsel  of  high  lineage  and  brow. 
May-blossom, — and  lightly  was  her  slender  nose 
Tip-tilted  like  the  petal  of  a  flower." 

"I'm  sure  my  nose  is  not  tip-tilted,  and  it's  very  rude 
of  you  to  say  it  is." 

"But  your  brow  is  may-blossom.  The  compliment 
atones  for  the  insult." 

"Sir  Gareth,"  she  replied  with  a  low  laugh,  "you've 
missed  your  vocation.  You're  no  scullion,  and  I  be- 
lieve you  know  no  more  of  kitchen-vassalage  than  I 
do.  You're  nothing  but  a  New  York  reporter  satiris- 
ing flappers  at  a  pink  tea." 

"That  shows  a  total  ignorance  of  my  abilities.  I 
assure  you,  Lynette,  that  I  can  cook  as  well  as  any 
man  in  Fruitvale.  And  I'm  going  to  teach  you.  My 
first  order  is  that  you  get  fir-cones  for  the  fire,  while 
I  fill  the  kettle  at  the  river." 

It  was  a  delightful  bit  of  pantomime  that  we  had 
hit  upon,  and  it  was  delightful  to  see  the  way  in  which 
Alice  entered  into  it.  I  had  called  her  Lynette,  but 
a  better  name  would  have  been  a  Cinderella  of  the 
Woods.  Her  hair,  loosened  in  swimming,  fell  in  a 
dark  mass  upon  her  slender  shoulders,  and  her  bare 
feet  were  but  partially  concealed  by  an  old  pair  of 


66  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

canvas  bathing  shoes.  She  went  into  the  wood,  hold- 
ing her  dress  high  as  an  apron  in  which  to  collect 
the  fir-cones,  looking  back  at  me  from  time  to  time 
■with  a  mocking  smile. 

She  returned  presently,  and  flung  the  dry  cones  upon 
the  fire,  which  immediately  blazed  up  into  clear  flame. 

"And  what  next,  Sir  Gareth?" 

"Wash  the  dishes,"  I  said  severely.     "They  need  it 

badly." 

"And  in  the  meantime,  what  are  you  going  to  do  ?" 

"The  pupil  is  not  allowed  to  interrogate  the  mas- 
ter.    It's  against  the  rules." 

"But  I  presume  the  master  wishes  to  set  a  good  ex- 
ample, doesn't  he?" 

"Gareth  is  so  sure  of  his  virtues  that  he  feels  no 
compulsion  to  exhibit  them." 

"Of  course  he  is.     How  like  a  man!" 

"I  thought  you  admired  him." 

"I  did  until  I  saw  his  deficiencies. 

"Lynette  didn't  see  any." 

"But  he  saw  hers.  He  said  her  nose  was  tip-tilted. 
Really  now  do  tell  me,  is  my  nose  tip-tilted?" 

She  stooped  to  the  pail  of  water  I  had  brought  from 
the  river,  and  pretended  to  use  it  as  a  mirror. 

"I'm  really  afraid  it  is,  you  know.  Or  is  it  only 
the  water  makes  it  look  so?" 

"It's  the  most  adorable  little  nose  in  the  world," 
I  replied.  "And  now  that  you've  extorted  that  com- 
pliment from  me,  will  you  please  wash  the  dishes?" 

"I  suppose  you  think  I  can't.    Well,  you  shall  see." 

She  went  to  work  at  once,  dipping  the  dishes  in  the 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  67 

pail  of  water,  and  I  wiped  them  as  she  handed  them 
to  me.  The  temptation  of  those  slim  hands  so  close 
to  mine  was  too  much  for  me.  I  stooped  and  kissed 
them. 

"Is  that  part  of  the  idyll?"  she  said  demurely. 

"Of  our  idyll,"  I  replied. 

"I  didn't  know  it  was  an  idyll,"  she  replied  with  a 
blush,     "I  thought  it  was  a  game." 

"So  did  Lynette,  until  she  knew  better,"  I  ventured 
to  retort. 

"But  I'm  not  Lynette,  I'm  only  a  washer  of  dishes. 
And,  O,  I'm  so  hungry." 

"We'll  soon  remedy  that.  I'm  going  to  fry  the 
bacon." 

"And  I'll  make  the  tea.  That's  quite  within  my 
very  humble  competence,  you  know." 

The  bacon  was  soon  sizzling  in  the  pan. 

"Please  give  me  a  very  large  helping,"  she  said. 
"I  have  a  most  primitive  appetite." 

"Don't  you  think  we'd  better  wake  the  others  ?  It's 
half-past  six,  you  know." 

"I'd  rather  not.  I  like  it  better  with  just  you  and 
me.  Besides,  I'm  greedy,  and  I  want  a  lot.  I  might 
not  get  as  much  if  the  others  were  here." 

She  laughed  like  a  child  engaged  in  a  plot  to  cheat 
her  elders. 

"That,  at  all  events,  is  a  primitive  temper,"  I  said. 

"O,  I  shall  be  civilised  enough,  presently,  when  I'm 
properly  dressed.  Let's  make  the  most  of  the  primi- 
tive while  it  lasts." 

"I  wish  it  could  last  forever." 


68  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Forever  is  a  big  word.  I'm  content  with  the  pres- 
ent.    Aren't  you?" 

And  I  was.  What  was  there  better  than  to  enjoy 
the  present,  and  what  greater  folly  than  to  discount 
the  present  by  the  threat  of  the  future? 

"After  all,  the  present  is  all  we  really  have,"  she 
said  gravely.  "Yesterday  is  dead  and  to-morrow  is 
not  born." 

There  came  to  us  a  noise  of  grumbling  voices  in 
the  men's  tent.     Vernon  and  Button  were  awake. 

"There  ends  our  beautiful  present,"  said  Alice  in 
a  whisper.     "I  must  go." 

She  rose  from  the  log  on  which  she  was  seated, 
and  drew  her  dress  round  her  bare  feet.  She  stretched 
out  her  hands  to  me,  and  said,  "You  may  kiss  them 
now  if  you  wish  to.  It's  the  last  act  in  our  little  game 
— or  idyll — which  is  it?  What  a  pity  it  has  to  end 
so  soon!" 

"Why  not  think  of  it  as  beginning,  not  ending? 
And,  Alice,  it  is  for  you  to  say  whether  it  is  a  game 
or  an  idyll." 

She  shook  her  head  and  smiled. 

We  could  hear  Button  threshing  round  the  tent  in 
search  of  his  boots. 

"Good-bye,  Gareth,"  she  whispered. 

She  moved  cautiously  toward  the  women's  tent,  and 
disappeared. 

VIII 

There  are  days  that  stand  out  in  memory  as  peculiar 
•and  isolated  by  a  sort  of  glorious  intensity.     It  is  as 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  69 

though  life  ceased  to  be  dispersed  and  became  con- 
centrated Hke  a  river  that  after  long  placidity  flows 
with  splendid  violence  in  a  glory  of  foam  and  singing 
water  and  sunlit  depth. 

That  day  at  Silver  Lakes  was  such  a  day.  Youth 
and  health,  strength  and  happiness  poured  out  their 
treasures  for  us.  The  discomforts  of  the  night  were 
soon  forgotten  and  became  a  matter  for  happy  jest. 
After  breakfast  we  all  swam  in  the  lake,  and  then 
made  preparations  for  an  exploration  of  the  moun- 
tains. At  the  back  of  our  camp  a  rough  trail  led  to 
some  old  mines,  about  six  miles  away.  No  one  knew 
much  about  them,  but  there  was  at  least  the  certainty 
of  fine  scenery,  and  Button  professed  some  knowledge 
of  a  glacier  hidden  somewhere  in  the  folds  of  the 
hills  that  lay  behind  the  mines. 

"I  was  there  once,"  he  said,  "but  I  travelled  by  a 
trail  that  entered  on  the  other  side.  However,  what's 
it  matter?  We  shall  get  a  fine  trip,  and  if  we  strike 
'the  glacier,  so  much  the  better." 

*T'll  tell  you  what  we  should  do,"  said  Vernon. 
"Let's  take  the  horses  and  some  food.  I've  been  at 
the  mines,  and  there  are  some  old  bunk  houses  there. 
We  might  sleep  in  them,  and  come  back  to-morrow." 

This  propostion  was  received  with  immediate  fa- 
vour. None  of  us  were  eager  to  sleep  in  a  tent  again, 
if  we  could  avoid  it,  and,  as  Mrs.  Vernon  put  it,  "it 
always  spoils  the  day  when  one  has  to  hurry  back 
at  a  certain  hour.  It  makes  one  think  of  catching  the 
only  theatre  train  at  midnight." 


70  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

We  laughed  at  the  reminiscence :  it  seemed  absurdly 
incongruous  with  the  solitude  of  Silver  Lakes. 

"Did  you  often  do  that?"  I  asked. 

"Yes,"  she  replied  with  a  grimace.  "On  penalty 
of  being  locked  out.  My  father  was  a  very  pious  man 
who  didn't  believe  in  latch-keys.  He  considered  them 
immoral.  He  didn't  really  approve  of  theatres,  but 
he  was  absolutely  hostile  to  latch-keys.  A  daughter 
with  a  latch-key  was  the  horrifying  symbol  of  the 
whole  revolt  of  woman." 

"I  wonder  what  he  would  say  if  he  saw  you  now." 

"The  dear  man's  dead  long  ago,"  she  said  quietly. 
"And,  do  you  know,  I  often  try  to  picture  him,  but  the 
only  real  picture  I  have  is  of  him  sitting  up  waiting 
for  me  when  I  came  home  from  the  theatre.  He  was 
generally  reading,  or  pretending  to,  and  he  used  to 
look  up  at  me  with  a  kind  of  indignant  patience.  I 
believe  the  thing  I'm  sorriest  for  when  I  remember 
him  is  that  I  so  often  kept  him  up  at  nights." 

I  had  some  similar  memories,  and  should  have  re- 
vealed them  had  not  Vernon  at  that  moment  arrived 
with  the  horses. 

"Who  wants  to  ride?"  he  asked.  "Don't  you, 
Alice?" 

"Certainly  not,"  she  replied.  "There's  nothing  an 
English  woman  can  do  that  an  American  can't." 

"Well,  at  all  events  you  beat  us  all  in  getting  up 
early." 

She  flushed  at  that,  and  turned  the  conversation  by 
demanding  a  new  lace  for  her  boots.  Vernon  was  at 
once  upon  his  knees,  lacing  her  boots  for  her. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  71 

"Good  man,"  grinned  Button.  "A  perfect  knight 
of  dames,  isn't  he?" 

*'Gareth  and  Lynette,"  said  Alice.  And  then  with 
a  sly  glance  at  me,  "New  version,  you  know." 

"What  do  you  mean  by  that?"  said  the  innocent 
Vernon. 

"Only  a  quotation,"  she  replied.  "Thank  you.  And 
now  let  us  start." 

The  trail  rose  rapidly  from  the  wet  grass  into  open 
rocky  country,  where  the  sun  beat  on  us  with  great 
strength.  It  was  a  relief  to  enter  into  woods,  although 
the  trail  was  here  made  difficult  by  fallen  timber. 
Overhead  the  sky  hung  in  what  seemed  torn  blue  rib- 
bons, caught  among  the  tree-tops.  We  went  forward 
slowly,  clambering  over  these  slippery  barriers,  and 
it  was  wonderful  to  see  how  the  horses  took  them. 
It  was  impossible  to  lead  them;  we  had  enough  to  do 
to  take  care  of  ourselves.  But  they  never  hesitated. 
They  climbed  like  goats,  always  choosing  the  easiest 
way,  and  we  were  content  to  follow  their  superior 
wisdom.  Every  now  and  then  they  turned  aside  from 
the  trail,  in  some  boggy  place,  nosing  through  the 
undergrowth  for  some  hidden  spring  which  they  knew 
was  there.  After  a  long  while  we  worked  our  way 
out  of  the  woods  and  came  upon  a  steep  slope,  cov- 
ered with  the  gigantic  boulders  of  an  ancient  land- 
slide. In  a  few  moments  we  were  at  the  top  of  the 
pass.  Below  us  lay  a  narrow  valley  with  a  turbulent 
discoloured  stream.  At  the  end  of  the  valley  rose  a 
confused  mass  of  derricks  and  dreary  heaps  of  refuse. 
This  was  the  Lost  Lode  Mine. 


72  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Nothing  more  desolate  could  be  conceived,  and  we 
regretted    the   green   brightness   of    the   Silver   Lake 
valley  which  we  had  left.     Here  there  was  no  green- 
ness; the  very  trees  were  dead.     They  rose  like  regi- 
ments of  skeletons,  the  witnesses  of  some  ancient  bat- 
tle,  fought  out  long  ago  with  thunder  and  cyclone. 
A  solitary  eagle  sailed  above  these  murdered  forests. 
We  could  see  the  loose  twigs  and  branches  of  his  nest 
upon  a  spiral  crag  of  rock.     Beyond  the  immediate 
walls  of  this  solitary  valley  rose  peak  behind  peak  of 
bare  rock,  some  grey,  some  olive-coloured,  some  won- 
derfully stained  with  rose  and  saffron.     They  were 
all  pyramidal   in    form,   and   the   rose-coloured   ones 
seemed  to  tremble  in  the  heat-haze,  and  appeared  in- 
substantial as  sun-saturated  clouds.     I  had  seen  moun- 
tain scenery  before  in  other  lands,  but  nowhere  had 
I  seen  mountains  that  gave  such  a  sense  of  primeval 
vacancy  as  these.     It  was  as  though  the  very  ribs 
of  the  earth  itself  stood  exposed,  the  very  framework 
of  the  world,  unclothed  by  any  beautiful  illusion.    The 
thrones  of  the  last  judgment  might  have  been  set  in 
such  a  theatre,  and  one  could   fancy  the  ghosts  of 
a  thousand  generations  gathered  there,  waiting  for  the 
last  trump. 

It  was  early  afternoon  when  we  reached  the  mine- 
buildings.  The  mine  itself  was  a  hole  in  a  vast  preci- 
pice a  thousand  feet  above  us.  To  it  ran  a  wire  cable 
on  which  the  tiny  buckets  of  ore  moved.  The  men 
actually  working  in  the  mine  did  not  come  down  for 
weeks  together.  Food  was  carried  to  them  by  the 
same  means  that  the  ore  came  down.    Their  one  con- 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  y2, 

nection  with  the  outer  world  was  this  aerial  tramway. 
One  could  not  but  marvel  at  the  restless  energy  and 
greed  of  men  which  had  attacked  this  solitude  in 
search  of  gain,  and  had  dragged  here  by  incalculable 
labour  the  masses  of  machinery  necessary  for  his  toil. 
One  wondered  also  what  were  the  thoughts  of  men, 
toiling  in  a  tunnel  of  the  mountain,  higher  than  an 
eagle's  eyrie,  insignificant  as  flies  upon  a  wall.  A  cool 
draught  of  wind  blew  among  the  mine  buildings,  and 
a  loud  stream  clamoured. 

But  for  youth  and  happiness  solitude  has  no  alarms ; 
it  is  but  a  new  variety  of  experience.  We  were  glad 
to  find  no  one  there — no  one,  that  is,  but  an  old  lame 
man,  who  had  lived  so  long  in  silence  that  he  ap- 
peared to  have  lost  the  faculty  of  speech.  He  had 
lived  there  all  through  the  winter,  and  the  one  sub- 
ject on  which  he  had  anything  to  say  was  the  depth 
of  the  snow  in  January. 

"Ten  feet,  it  were,"  he  said.  *Tt's  the  deepest  I 
have  ever  known;"  and  he  spoke  with  a  kind  of  pride, 
as  though  he  were  responsible  for  this  unusual  depth. 

"Over  the  roofs  of  the  houses,"  he  added. 

How  did  he  live?  "O,  kep'  a  good  fire  going,  eat, 
and  slept — there  was  nothing  else  to  do." 

It  seemed  he  had  a  daughter  somewhere  in  Summer- 
ton.  At  least  she  was  there  when  last  he  heard  from 
her,  and  that  was  a  year  ago.  She  came  to  see  him 
then,  but  he  didn't  expect  her  to  come  again.  She 
wasn't  strong,  and  the  journey  was  over-long  for  her. 
His  wife  was  dead  long  ago.  He  had  no  friends,  and 
didn't  seem   to   need  them.     He  brightened  a   little 


74  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

when  Vernon  said  he  had  worked  in  the  mines  at 
Rossland  for  a  season.  He  had  been  there,  too.  He 
had  the  air  of  a  man  who  recalled  with  difficulty  a 
recollection  which  had  become  remote  and  unreal. 

"Did  you  ever  work  in  these  mines?"  said  Vernon. 

"I've  done  such  a  thing,"  he  said,  as  though  he  were 
confessing  a  fault.  "But  I  find  mines:  that  was  my 
business  before  I  went  lame." 

"Then  you  were  a  prospector,  eh?" 

■'That's  me.  I've  tramped  all  over  this  country. 
I've  found  mines  that  has  made  many  a  man  rich. 
But  they  didn't  make  me  rich.  Somehow  when  I'd 
found  a  good  prospect  I  always  got  tired  of  it,  and 
wanted  to  move  on  and  find  another.  That's  me.  I 
knew  all  about  this  mine  years  ago  when  no  one  else 
did.  I  didn't  exactly  find  it,  but  I  knew  about  it. 
That's  why,  when  I  went  lame,  they  gave  me  the  job 
of  looking  after  things  here.  I've  been  here  twelve 
years,  and  most  likely  I  shall  die  here." 

He  shuffled  off,  and  we  saw  no  more  of  him.  But 
before  he  went  to  his  cabin  he  showed  us  the  deserted 
bunk-house,  and  told  us  we  might  sleep  there  if  we 
wished. 

The  bunk-house  was  in  pretty  fair  condition,  al- 
though the  windows  were  broken  and  the  door  lack- 
ing. It  was  a  long  building  of  rough  lumber.  At 
one  end  was  a  rusty  stove,  and  along  its  sides  were 
the  double  shelves  on  which  the  men  had  slept.  It 
bore  an  odd  resemblance  to  the  catacombs  at  Rome. 

We  soon  filled  the  bunks  with  hay,  of  which  there 
was  a  plentiful  supply,  lit  the  fire  in  the  stove,  and 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  75 

had  our  meal  ready.  The  night  fell  swiftly,  for  we 
were  completely  shut  in  by  mountains.  With  the  sink- 
ing of  the  sun  the  wind  diminished,  until  the  air  was 
entirely  still.  To  our  surprise  it  was  not  cold  as  it 
was  at  Silver  Lakes,  although  we  were  at  least  two 
thousand  feet  higher.  The  nearness  of  the  mountains 
made  the  camp  as  snug  as  a  house,  wanting  only  a 
roof;  or  rather  it  had  a  roof  of  sky,  perfectly  blue 
and  cloudless.  We  were  in  reality  at  the  bottom  of 
a  gorge,  which  opened  at  one  point  only  into  a  floor 
of  sparse  meadowland. 

After  supper  we  sat  around  the  stove  talking  and 
presently  began  to  sing.  Vernon,  who  had  a  sweet 
light  tenor,  sang  Tom  Bowling,  with  a  humorous 
allusion  to  the  upper  bunks  which  presented  an  ad- 
mirable opportunity  for  going  "aloft."  Mrs.  Vernon 
started  *Tn  the  dear  dead  days  beyond  recall,"  which 
provoked  memories  of  England.  Then  came  Swanee 
River,  which  we  sang  in  chorus.  Alice  had  taken  her 
seat  on  a  box  at  the  other  side  of  the  stove  from  me. 
She  glanced  at  me  from  time  to  time,  like  a  shy  child. 
During  the  long  day  we  had  had  no  word  together, 
and  she  had  appeared  to  avoid  me. 

Our  songs  died  down,  and  we  sat  silent.  It  had 
grown  quite  dark.  In  the  broken  doorway  a  little 
patch  of  starry  heaven  shone;  from  the  open  stove 
a  pool  of  red  light  fell  upon  the  floor.  There  was  no 
other  light. 

Suddenly  Alice  sprang  up  with  a  cry. 

"Look,  what's  that?"  she  said,  pointing  to  the  door. 

We  looked,  and  saw  what  appeared  to  be  a  white 


yd  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ghost  with  traihng  luminous  robes  glide  past  the  door. 
Another  followed  and  another.  A  faint  crackling,  as 
of  broken  twigs,  filled  the  air.  A  pale  radiance 
streamed  in  at  the  broken  windows,  filling  the  room 
with  a  kind  of  attenuated  moonlight. 

We  ran  to  the  door,  and  gazed  down  the  gorge  to- 
wards the  little  patch  of  meadowland.  There  the 
luminous  ghosts  marched  in  long  procession.  They 
separated,  re-united,  appeared  to  dance  in  an  aerial 
minuet,  disappeared  only  to  appear  again  upon  the 
high  rocky  bluffs,  along  which  they  passed  to  melt  into 
the  starry  sky. 

"The  Aurora,  by  George!"  cried  Button.  "Come 
out  and  look  behind  you." 

Behind  us  rose  the  high  bare  mountains  where  the 
mine  w^as,  with  one  tiny  light  shining  a  thousand  feet 
above  us.  The  light  moved  to  and  fro.  The  men  on 
that  lonely  shelf  of  rock  appeared  to  be  signalling. 

Again  the  ghost-dance  began.  The  white  procession 
moved  along  the  very  summits  of  the  mountains,  and 
then  swept  down  into  the  gorge.  The  light  at  the 
mine's  mouth  shone  through  the  bright  diaphanous 
mist,  and  seemed  a  jewel  fastened  upon  robes  of  silver. 
Then  the  whole  scene  changed.  The  ghost  proces- 
sion moved  along  the  hills,  thinned  out  and  disap- 
peared. Vast  arcs  of  splendour  bridged  the  northern 
sky.  The  whole  heaven  opened  like  a  bursting  flower 
of  light.  Long  streamers,  faintly  stained  with  pink, 
were  flung  up  into  the  topmost  height  of  the  firma- 
ment. Great  wheels  of  light  succeeded  them,  rolling 
along  the  hills  like  the  chariots  of  an  army.    The  edges 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  -j-j 

of  the  hills  were  defined  as  sharply  as  though  etched 
in  indigo  upon  a  plate  of  steel.  Fountains  of  fire 
rose  at  intervals,  celestial  geysers,  flinging  a  foam  of 
light  into  the  sky,  and  dying  down  deliberately  just 
as  a  geyser  does  when  its  strength  is  on  the  ebb.  Then 
the  ghosts  began  to  walk  once  more.  Their  long  filmy 
robes  trailed  across  the  world,  clothing  everything  with 
phosphorescence  such  as  one  beholds  in  summer  seas 
behind  a  vessel's  wake.  We  watched  the  spectacle  with 
a  breathless  awe.  For  two  hours  it  continued,  follow- 
ing the  same  programme  of  processional  ghosts,  arcs 
of  light,  geysers  of  spouting  splendour,  and  then  again 
the  ghosts.  It  ceased  as  suddenly  as  it  began.  It  was 
as  though  the  hand  of  God  hushed  this  revel  of  the 
heavens,  and  once  more  the  familiar  stars  shone  out 
upon  the  dark  front  of  Night.  The  lamp,  signalling 
from  the  mine,  must  have  attracted  the  attention  of 
the  lame  man.  He  came  hobbling  along  the  path, 
and  called  to  us,  "Did  ye  see  it?" 

We  asked  him  if  it  appeared  often. 

"Not  in  early  August,"  he  answered.  "No,  I've 
never  seen  it  so  early  in  the  year  as  this." 

"What's  it  mean?     Fine  weather?"  asked  Button. 

"It's  an  omen,"  he  replied  gravely. 

"Of  what?"  said  Button. 

"That  remains  to  be  seen.  But  be  sure  it's  an  omen 
of  something  big  and  drefiful." 

He  hobbled  back  to  his  solitary  hut.  But  somehow 
his  phrase  stuck  in  the  mind.  The  intense  pleasure 
we  had  found  in  beauty  gave  place  to  a  gravity  of 


78  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

apprehension  which  we  made  no  effort  to  conceal.  An 
omen — of  what? 

There  was  no  possible  reply. 

I  fell  asleep  with  the  old  man's  grim  prophecy  whis- 
pering at  my  ear.  and  through  my  dreams  I  still  saw 
those  ghost  armies  marching  in  their  luminous  pro- 
cessions. 

IX 

I  woke  suddenly  with  that  shock  of  startled  appre- 
hension one  has  in  a  place  totally  unfamiliar,  when  the 
mind  gropes  to  find  its  bearings.  The  Soul  had  gone 
away  in  sleep,  God  knows  where,  and  was  now  knock- 
ing at  the  door  of  the  body,  eager  to  get  in,  as  if 
pursued  by  the  spectres  of  the  Void.  I  sat  up  in  my 
narrow  bunk,  gazed  round,  and  very  gradually  per- 
ceived the  outlines  of  reality.  A  grey  light  filled  the 
bunk-house.  Through  the  doorway  and  the  broken 
windows  I  could  see  the  paling  stars.  They  went  out 
one  by  one,  like  candles  that  burned  down  in  their 
sockets. 

I  looked  round  the  room.  All  the  others  were 
asleep.  Vernon  lay  perfectly  still  upon  his  back,  like 
an  effigy  of  marble  in  some  ancient  Church.  Button 
was  curled  up,  with  his  face  to  the  wall.  Alice  lay 
with  one  arm  beneath  her  head,  and  the  other  hang- 
ing over  the  side  of  the  bunk.  In  the  next  bunk  lay 
Mrs.  Button  and  Mrs.  Vernon,  face  to  face,  with  their 
arms  entwined.  Were  their  souls  also  far  away,  speed- 
ing on  mystic  errands,  not  yet  aware  of  the  recall 
to  earth? 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  79 

"She  is  not  dead  but  sleepeth."  The  old  sacred 
words,  spoken  by  One  who  saw  sleep  where  others 
saw  death,  came  to  my  mind,  but  with  a  reversal  of 
the  sequence.  "Not  sleeping,  but  dead — What  if  this 
were  true?  What  is  death  but  the  departure  of  the 
soul,  and  does  not  the  soul  leave  us  in  sleep  also? 
There  came  to  me  an  overwhelming  sense  of  the  mys- 
tery of  the  thing  we  call  life.  I  looked  again  at  the 
faces  of  my  comrades,  and  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  had 
never  truly  seen  them  before.  If  Vernon's  face  had 
the  solemn  dignity  of  a  marble  effigy  in  an  ancient 
church,  was  it  because  some  ancestor  of  his,  centuries 
ago,  had  fought  with  Turk  and  Saracen  ?  Perhaps : 
even  the  body  of  a  London  clerk  is  built  up  of  heroic 
dust,  and  is  the  synthesis  of  centuries.  And  to  what 
bourne  had  the  souls  of  Mrs,  Button  and  Mrs,  Vernon 
passed?  And  then  there  was  the  face  of  Alice.  Its 
outlines  were  sharpened  by  sleep.  Sleep,  like  a  great 
artist,  had  selected  only  its  finest  elements,  and  had 
composed  them  into  a  new  picture.  Trivial  records 
of  discontent  were  obliterated,  and  instead  there  was 
something  that  could  be  best  described  as  pathetic 
majesty.  And  in  the  one  hand,  hanging  so  limply  with 
extended  fingers,  there  was  pure  pathos,  the  pathos  of 
a  childish  helplessness.  I  had  kissed  those  fingers  in 
a  gallantry  that  was  half  ironical  a  few  hours  ago : 
suddenly  I  knew  that  if  ever  I  kissed  them  again  it 
would  be  with  a  real  homage.  And  while  I  looked 
the  arm  was  lifted,  and  lay  across  the  girlish  breast, 
and  her  eyes  opened. 

She  also  gazed  round  on  the  unusual  scene  with 


8o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

startled  apprehension  as  I  had  done.  My  Hps  shaped 
her  name  in  a  soundless  whisper,  and  she  smiled  at 
me.  She  slipped  softly  from  her  rough  bed,  and  came 
across  the  room,  moving  toward  the  door.  I  followed 
her,  and  we  stood  silent,  gazing  out  at  that  dew- 
washed  morning  world.  Nothing  was  awake  but 
ourselves — nothing  but  the  eagle  which  we  had  seen 
the  day  before.  He  was  sailing  in  wide  curves  in 
the  upper  air,  where  his  wings  caught  the  light  of 
the  sun  that  was  not  yet  risen  on  us.  I  had  the  thought 
of  asking  her  to  come  and  bathe,  as  we  had  done  on 
the  previous  day,  but  I  was  subtly  aware  of  a  new 
shyness  which  had  sprung  up  between  us.  We  were 
sharers,  it  was  true,  in  a  primitive  community  of  life 
more  intimate  than  yesterday's,  and  yet  things  were 
changed  by  an  altered  consciousness  of  one  another. 
Did  she  feel,  as  I  felt,  that  any  new  step  in  our  rela- 
tionship would  be  decisive?  I  wondered,  and  to  my 
wonder  there  was  joined  a  great  yearning  and  a  fear. 
Yet  in  the  silence  of  that  communion  I  realised  that 
we  had  come  much  nearer  to  each  other  than  in  the 
glad  frank  comradeship  of  yesterday. 

For  some  minutes — it  may  have  been  ten  or  fifteen 
— we  stood  in  the  doorway,  gazing  at  the  slow  unfold- 
ing of  the  day.  Her  hair  fell  in  a  dark  mass  upon 
her  shoulders,  and  I  was  aware  of  its  fragrance.  In 
many  scenes,  how  different  and  long  after,  that  per- 
fume was  to  haunt  me.  I  touched  it  timidly,  with 
a  great  desire  to  kiss  it,  to  bury  my  face  in  its  soft 
abundance.  She  seemed  to  guess  my  thought,  and 
moved  a  little  away  from  me.     Then  she  looked  up. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  8i 

and  said  in  a  whisper,  "Go  now — please."  She  turned 
back  into  the  silent  house,  and  I  went  down  the  valley 
to  a  place  where  the  river  broadened  into  a  foaming 
pool,  where  I  bathed.  When  I  returned  the  fire  was 
lit,  and  the  breakfast  ready. 

After  breakfast  we  set  out  upon  our  excursion  to 
the  glacier.  The  lame  man  gave  us  some  general  di- 
rections. There  was  no  trail,  but  if  we  followed  the 
stream  we  must  reach  the  glacier,  for  the  water  was 
glacier  water. 

We  soon  found  that  there  was  a  vast  difference  be- 
tween the  roughest  kind  of  trail  and  no  trail  at  all. 
We  had  left  the  horses  at  the  bunk-house,  and  it  was 
well  that  we  had,  for  riding  was  impossible.  We  were 
at  one  moment  climbing  over  huge  boulders,  at  an- 
other wading  ankle-deep  in  bog,  or  pushing  our  way 
through  a  tangled  mass  of  undergrowth.  Gradually 
we  worked  free  of  these  obstacles  and  came  out  upon 
the  open  mountain  side. 

To  add  to  our  discomfort  the  nature  of  the  day  had 
altered,  and  the  weather  showed  signs  of  change.  A 
bluish  haze,  hot  and  stifling,  filled  the  valleys.  The 
sun  hung  like  a  disc  of  copper  overhead.  Over  the 
summits  of  the  mountains  to  the  south-east,  clouds 
of  dazzling  whiteness  stood  stationary.  Across  their 
white  fronts  grey  wisps  of  vapour,  thin  as  gossamer, 
moved  slowly. 

It  was  Vernon  who  called  my  attention  to  these 
signs  of  aerial  commotion. 

"That's  thunder,"  he  said. 

I  was  walking  with  him  at  the  time,  a  quarter  of 


82  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

a  mile  at  least  behind  the  rest  of  the  party.  Dutton  was 
a  few  hundred  yards  ahead,  and  much  further  on, 
sharply  defined  against  the  sky,  we  could  see  the 
women. 

"It's  amazing  how  the  women  measure  up  to  a 
job  like  tliis,"  he  said.  "They're  as  light  on  their  feet 
as  mountain  goats.  I've  gone  on  a  good  many  excur- 
sions of  this  kind  with  women,  and  I've  always  found 
they  could  wear  the  men  down  easily.  I  guess  it's 
spirit  that  does  it." 

"It  certainly  isn't  training,"  I  said. 

"O,  you're  thinking  of  Alice.  So  was  I.  It's  won- 
derful how  she  takes  hold  of  this  sort  of  thing." 

He  looked  at  me  curiously,  and  then  added,  "Do 
you  mind  if  I  ask  you  something  about  Alice?" 

"Not  at  all,"  I  said. 

"Well,  you  see,  she's  our  guest,"  he  said  in  a  tone 
of  apology,  "and  it's  easy  to  see  you  like  her.  I  won- 
dered if  you  did  more  than  like  her." 

"I  don't  know,  Vernon.  But  I  don't  mind  telling 
you  this  much,  I  am  thinking  of  her  a  great  deal." 

"That's  why  I  spoke,  and  I  should  have  done  so 
before,  only  I  didn't  want  to  offend  you.  Do  you 
mind  if  I  tell  you  something  about  her?" 

"I'm  sure  you'll  only  tell  me  good,"  I  replied,  "Go 
on. 

"Well,  what  I  wanted  to  say  was  this.  I've  a  no- 
tion you  think  her  people  are  wealthy.  She  gives  that 
impression,  you  know." 

"You  mean  by  her  manner,  her  style,  and  so  forth  ?" 

"Yes,  that's  it.    Well,  here's  the  truth.     Her  father 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  85 

■was  a  wealthy  man  up  to  about  a  year  ago,  and  then 
all  his  affairs  went  smash.  But  Alice  doesn't  know 
that:  he  was  at  pains  to  conceal  it  from  her.  Before 
the  smash  came  he  sent  her  away  on  a  round  of  vis- 
its. My  wife  knew  the  family;  when  she  first  came 
to  America  she  was  employed  by  them  for  a  time  as 
governess.  She  was  not  long  with  them,  for  I  fol- 
lowed her  from  England,  married  her,  and  we  came 
to  Fruitvale.  One  day  we  had  a  letter  from  Alice's 
father,  telling  us  of  his  financial  embarrassments,  and 
asking  us  to  invite  Alice  to  visit  us,  and  keep  her  with 
us  as  long  as  we  could.  He  thought  that  in  a  remote 
place  like  Fruitvale  she  would  not  be  likely  to  hear 
of  his  misfortune,  and  he  was  resolved  not  to  spoil 
her  youth  by  telling  her.  I  thought  that  rather  fine 
of  him,  and,  of  course  we  were  glad  to  have  Alice, 
my  wife  especially,  for  she  had  always  felt  a  strong 
attachment  to  her." 

"And  she  doesn't  know  anything  of  this?" 

"Nothing,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  though  I  some- 
times wonder  if  she  suspects  anything." 

"What's  the  justification  for  not  telling  her, 
Vernon  ?" 

"Well,  I  don't  know  how  to  put  it.  But  as  I  see 
it,  it's  something  like  this.  She  has  to  live  the  simple 
life  here,  and  I'm  in  hope  that  she  may  get  to  like 
it  so  well  that  when  she  finds  out  she  isn't  wealthy  she 
won't  mind  so  much.  She'll  have  found  herself,  don't 
you  know,  found  out  what  real  living  is.  Something 
like  that,  Waller." 


84  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"You're  a  good  fellow,  Vernon.  And  more  than 
that  you're  a  wise  one,"  I  said  heartily. 

"O,  now,"  he  said  simply,  "I'd  hate  you  to  think 
that  I  told  you  this  just  to  be  complimented.  Only 
you've  all  sorts  of  brilliant  prospects,  haven't  you? 
And  I  didn't  want  you  to  be  deceived  about  Alice." 

"That's  all  right,  Vernon.  I  can  truthfully  say  I'm 
not  that  sort  of  man.  I've  never  once  thought  of  Alice 
in  connection  with  money.  And  do  you  know,  what 
you  say  is  a  great  help  to  me.  It  helps  me  to  under- 
stand Alice,  and  it  stirs  my  sympathy." 

"That's  why  I  told  you.  But  come,  we  must  go. 
The  women  are  beckoning  us." 

We  could  see  them  standing  on  a  crag  that  jutted 
out  from  the  mountain  wall,  just  at  the  point  where 
the  valley  turned. 

"I  think  they've  sighted  the  glacier,"  said  Vernon. 

We  pushed  on  rapidly,  overtaking  Button,  and  came 
to  the  sharp  bend  of  the  mountain  where  the  women 
stood.  They  stood  upon  a  rocky  shelf,  defended  by 
a  low  parapet,  which  looked  so  like  human  masonry 
that  it  would  have  been  easy  to  believe  it  was  the  out- 
look of  some  prehistoric  sentinel.  Immediately  oppo- 
site was  the  glacier,  a  white  frozen  river  forced  be- 
tween black  precipices,  and  broken  at  the  out-fall  into 
a  cascade  of  blue  ice.  It  was  not  beautiful — it  lacked 
proportion ;  but  it  was  overwhelmingly  impressive. 
There  was  something  savage  in  the  way  in  which  the 
black  sharp-toothed  rocks  ate  their  way  into  the  ice. 
I  could  have  thought  this  white  mass  a  flock  of  sheep, 
close  wedged  by  terror,  torn  and  harried  by  fanged 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  85 

wolf -like  rocks.     And  the  heavy  sky  aided  this  im- 
pression of  savage  terror. 

The  white  clouds  to  the  south-east  had  risen  now, 
like  a  vaster  world  pushed  up  above  our  prostrate 
world.  The  summits  only  of  these  invading  clouds 
kept  their  whiteness;  the  grey  scarfs  of  vapour  had 
thickened  into  lead,  and  the  bases  of  the  clouds  were 
a  lurid  indigo.  From  the  north-west  other  cloud 
masses  moved  to  meet  them.  They  came  like  a  vast 
aerial  fleet,  driven  before  a  gale.  Suddenly,  from  their 
sides,  fire  flashed,  as  though  some  invisible  Captain 
had  given  the  signal  for  battle.  A  vivid  blue  flame 
ran  across  the  glacier,  a  long  jagged  sword  of  fire  de- 
scended from  the  zenith.  Then,  all  at  once,  a  tre- 
mendous wind  came  roaring  down  the  valley,  and  the 
rain  fell  in  a  solid  mass. 

It  was  useless  to  seek  shelter.  All  we  could  do  was 
to  huddle  behind  the  parapet.  The  noise  of  wind  and 
roaring  water  and  detonating  thunder,  flung  back  in 
infinite  reverberations  from  those  granite  walls,  was 
so  great  that  we  could  not  hear  ourselves  speak.  I 
was  conscious  that  Vernon  had  hollowed  his  hands 
against  my  ear,  and  was  saying  something,  but  it  was 
some  minutes  before  I  caught  his  words.  They 
reached  me  at  last.     "Look  at  Alice,"  he  said. 

I  looked,  and  saw  her  standing  on  the  very  edge 
of  the  rock-shelf,  her  unbound  hair  driven  out  in  a 
straight  mass  before  the  wind,  her  hands  uplifted,  her 
clothes  clinging  to  her  so  closely  that  every  line  of 
her  body  was  distinct.    Vernon  nodded.     He  shouted 


86  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

again  through  his  hollowed  hands.    "Found  herself" — 
I  caught  the  words  at  last. 

The  mass  of  the  cloud-burst  had  passed,  and  great 
silver  rods  of  rain  fell  round  her.  The  lightnings 
seemed  actually  to  si)ill  their  fire  upon  her  head.  I 
watched  amazed.  Was  this  indeed  Alice  Croxon, 
daughter  of  Theodore  Croxon  of  New  York,  ruined 
millionaire,  bankrupt  speculator — or  a  new  Alice,  re- 
created by  the  mountains,  baptised  with  water  at  the 
font  of  the  tempest,  and  with  fire  by  the  Eligh-Priest 
of  the  Thunders? 

In  about  half  an  hour  the  storm  had  moderated,  but 
it  was  evident  that  the  glory  of  the  day  was  past. 
Masses  of  low  cloud  lay  along  the  glacier,  entirely 
concealing  it.  From  the  valley  at  our  feet  these  cloud 
masses  seemed  to  boil  up  like  steam  from  a  caldron. 

"It's  no  use  attempting  to  reach  the  glacier,"  said 
Vernon. 

"Perhaps  it  will  clear  up,"  I  said  hopefully. 

"Not  to-day.  When  a  storm  gets  into  these  narrow 
valleys  it  doesn't  seem  able  to  get  out.  We'd  better 
get  back  before  the  weather  grows  worse." 

"I  don't  see  how  it  can  be  worse.  Just  look  at  us," 
laughed  Mrs.  Vernon. 

And  indeed  the  sight  presented  was  so  absurd  that 
we  all  laughed.  We  were  drenched  to  the  skin,  and 
looked  as  if  we  had  been  dragged  through  a  river. 

"Come,  Alice,"  cried  Mrs.  Vernon,  "we're  going." 

She  made  no  reply.  When  at  last  she  turned  her 
head,  we  saw  that  her  face  was  pale  and  her  eyes 
blazing. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  87 

Although  it  was  still  early  afternoon,  it  had  become 
quite  dark.  What  light  there  was  had  a  livid  quality, 
which  had  the  effect  of  ghastliness. 

"Come,  Alice,"  called  Mrs.  Vernon  impatiently. 
"We've  no  time  to  lose." 

She  came  slowly  towards  us,  then  stopped  and 
looked  back,  pointing  to  the  mountains  from  whose 
heart  the  glacier  flowed.  We  saw  then  what  it  was 
that  filled  her  face  with  that  strange  ecstasy.  For  a 
few  brief  moments  the  tremendous  summits  thrust 
themselves  up  above  the  clouds,  covered  with  new- 
fallen  snow,  glittering  in  the  sun  like  crystal  cones. 
It  was  quite  literally  an  affair  of  moments:  for  while 
we  gazed  the  clouds  came  together  again  like  cur- 
tains drawn  by  an  invisible  stage-manager.  It  was 
a  vision  of  beauty,  so  bodiless  as  it  were,  that  I  felt 
as  though  I  had  gazed  for  an  awed  instant  on  the 
ineffable  loveliness  of  God  himself.  And  I  knew  by 
that  look  upon  the  face  of  Alice  that  she  also  shared 
my  thought. 

She  took  her  place  silently  at  my  side,  and  we  be- 
gan our  return  journey.  It  was  high  time  to  do  so. 
The  darkness  had  now  settled  down,  the  storm  was 
rolling  up  again  at  our  backs,  and  the  lightnings  were 
so  near  and  constant  that  they  seemed  actually  to 
run  between  our  feet.  The  stream  had  become  a  tor- 
rent, and  roared  hoarsely  in  its  course.  We  walked, 
silent  as  Indians,  in  single  file,  eagerly  intent  upon 
our  path.  With  the  river  to  guide  us,  we  could  not 
very  well  lose  our  way,  but  now  every  rock  and  log 
and  steep  slope  was  slippery  with  rain,  and  careful 


88  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

walking  was  necessary.  It  was  six  o'clock  as  we 
turned  the  last  bastion  of  the  hills,  and  saw  below  us 
the  huddled  buildings  of  the  camp.  Just  before  we 
reached  them  Alice  slipped  a  wet  hand  into  mine,  and 
said,  "Hasn't  it  been  glorious?" 

"You've  enjoyed  it?" 

"I  never  knew  what  enjoyment  meant  before.  I 
think  what  it  really  means  is  not  only  that  you're 
alive,  but  you  knozv  you're  alive." 

"But  aren't  you  tired?" 

"Not  a  bit.  I  believe  I  could  turn  round  and  do 
it  all  over  again.  But  I  will  confess  that  I'm  hungry. 
O  my,  how  hungry  I  am.  And  I  do  believe  that  I 
smell  coffee." 

She  laughed  like  a  child,  and  ran  ahead  of  me  to 
the  bunk-house,  clapping  her  hands. 

She  was  right  about  the  coffee.  The  old  lame  man, 
with  a  thoughtfulness  no  one  had  given  him  credit 
for,  had  lit  the  stove,  and  met  us  at  the  door  with  a 
steaming  can  of  coffee. 


Vernon's  weather-wisdom  was  justified.  A  thun- 
der-storm upon  the  prairies  passes  on  into  illimitable 
distances,  leaving  behind  it  an  atmosphere  pure  as 
crystal ;  but  in  the  mountains  it  rages  like  a  wild  beast 
in  a  cage.  It  flings  itself  against  the  rocks  in  fury, 
battles  for  escape,  and  is  continually  flung  back  again 
defeated.  All  night  we  listened  to  its  fierce  assaults. 
The  rain  drummed  upon  the  roof  in  an  incessant  up- 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  89 

roar.  The  frail  bunk-house  trembled  at  the  fearful 
detonations  of  the  thunder.  When  we  woke  the  next 
morning  a  heavy  mist  filled  the  narrow  gorge,  and 
the   mountains  were  invisible. 

"There's  only  one  thing  to  do,"  said  Vernon,  "get 
back  to  the  camp,  and  then  home.  It  will  make  a 
pretty  hard  day's  tramp,  but  we  can  do  it." 

We  started  immediately  after  breakfast.  If  any  po- 
lite metropolitan  had  seen  us,  he  would  no  doubt  have 
pitied  our  condition,  and  have  had  certain  wise  re- 
marks ready  on  the  folly  which  misnamed  hardship 
pleasure.  But  he  would  have  been  entirely  mistaken. 
There  is  a  joy  in  physical  exertion  which  is  its  own 
exceeding  great  reward.  Those  who  imagine  perfect 
weather  requisite  to  outdoor  enjoyment  have  never 
known  the  real  delight  of  rain.  The  misery  of  rain 
is  only  felt  as  long  as  you  are  trying  desperately  to 
keep  dry;  when  once  you  are  so  wet  that  you  cannot 
well  be  wetter  there  is  an  exquisite  pleasure  to  be 
found  in  the  freshness  and  coolness  of  the  air,  the 
fragrances  that  rise  from  soaked  earth  and  grass,  and 
the  stinging  buffets  of  the  storm.  So  we  were  a  laugh- 
ing party,  as  we  made  our  way  to  Silver  Lakes. 

"I  call  this  real  fun,"  said  Alice.  "Only  I  do  wish 
my  boots  wouldn't  squelch  so.  They  make  a  noise 
like  an  elder's  when  he  walks  up  the  Church  aisle  to 
take  a  Sunday  collection." 

"And  I  wish  petticoats  had  never  been  invented," 
said  Mrs.  Button. 

"And  I  hold  the  same  view  about  trousers,"  said 
Vernon.      "I   know   now   why   Scotsmen  wear  kilts. 


90  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

They  are  the  invention  of  a  country  where  it  rains 
three  hundred  days  a  year," 

"Don't  you  beheve  it,"  laughed  Mrs.  Vernon. 
*They  wear  them  to  show  their  legs.  They're  a  form 
of  pride." 

"Well,"  said  Mrs.  Dutton  plaintively,  "I  positively 
will  not  walk  another  yard  in  petticoats.  Mine  are 
so  wet  that  I  can't  move.    I  vote  we  take  them  off." 

This  remark  from  quiet  Mrs.  Dutton  excited  great 
mirth. 

"Well,  I  mean  it,"  she  said.  "You  men  don't  know 
what  it's  like  to  walk  with  yards  and  yards  of  wet 
clothes  clinging  to  you." 

"I  call  that  sound  sense,"  said  Alice  with  a  droll 
grimace.  "You  men  walk  on,  and  give  us  a  chance. 
I'm  going  to  take  mine  off." 

They  disappeared  behind  a  rock,  and  we  walked  on 
to  a  bend  in  the  trail,  beyond  which  we  waited  for 
them. 

"Do  you  think  they'll  do  it?"  said  Dutton. 

"They're  ready  to  do  anything,"  said  Vernon.  "It's 
amazing  what  spirits  they  have.  They're  like  school- 
girls on  a  holiday." 

And  when  they  overtook  us,  they  looked  like  school- 
girls, in  their  singular  slimness,  and  they  laughed 
like  school-girls  full  of  mischief. 

"You  see  us  in  our  habit  as  we  do  not  live,"  mocked 
Alice.     "I  wish  Fifth  Avenue  could  see  me." 

Her  tweed  dress  hung  in  a  straight  line,  the  rain 
sparkled  in  her  hair  and  hung  in  bright  drops  upon 
her  face.     She  looked  an  adorable  child. 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  91 

"I'll  run  you  a  race  now,  if  you  like,"  she  said. 
"Who'll  dare  me?" 

"What  is  the  prize?"  I  asked. 

"Don't  be  mercenary.  It  shows  a  bad  heart.  The 
reward  is  in  the  struggle,  not  the  prize,  as  some  one 
has  said." 

"All  right,  I'll  race  you  to  the  big  cedar  yonder. 
Come  on,  let's  all  race." 

She  ran  down  the  steep  slope,  light-footed  and 
graceful  as  a  fawn,  and  I  after  her.  A  bank  of  mist 
drifted  across  the  path,  leaving  only  the  branches  of 
the  cedar  visible.  We  plunged  into  it;  and  then,  just 
as  we  reached  our  goal,  she  stumbled  on  a  rolling  stone, 
and  I  caught  her  in  my  arms.  I  held  her  for  a  mo- 
ment only,  for  the  others  were  close  behind.  But 
in  that  moment  our  eyes  met,  hers  startled  like  a 
fawn's,  mine  eager  with  a  new  emotion.  My  lips 
sought  her  wet  cheek, 

"The  prize?"  I  whispered. 

"You've  taken  it.     I  didn't  give  it." 

"Won't  you  give  it,  please?" 

She  laid  her  wet  face  for  an  instant  against  mine, 
with  the  innocent  caress  of  a  child,  and  immediately 
drew  back.    "Remember  I  won  the  race,"  she  laughed. 

"I've  won  something  better — the  prize,"  I  said. 

The  others  broke  through  the  mist,  Mrs.  Vernon 
leading. 

"Who's  won?"  she  cried. 

"It's  a  tie,"  I  answered.     "Isn't  it,  Alice?" 

"It  looks  a  little  like  it,"  she  replied. 

After  that  mirthful  race  we  went  upon  our  way 


92  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

more  soberly.    The  three  women  led  most  of  the  time; 
they  did  not  walk  so  much  as  trip  and  dance  down 
the  trail.     Dutton  came  last  with  the  horses,  on  whose 
backs  were  our  impedimenta — including  the  petticoats. 
We  reached  Silver  Lakes  before  noon.     Our  tents 
were  blown  down  by  the  storm.     We  lit  a  fire  with 
difficulty  and  fried  our  last  eggs  and  bacon,  made  tea, 
and  prepared  for  the  last  stage  of  our  journey.     The 
thunder  still   ran   round   the  mountains   like  a  with- 
drawing artillery  fire.     Soon  after  noon  the  clouds 
lifted,  but  there  was  no  sun.    The  valley  seemed  deep- 
ened in  colour,  the  forests  were  black,  the  lakes  grey 
dulled  mirrors  in  a  frame  of  ebony.     Overhead  we 
saw  the  eagle  we  had  seen  the  day  before  at  the  sum- 
mit of  the  Lost  Lode   Mine.     He  hung  motionless 
above  the  lakes,  no  doubt  watching  with  those  far- 
ranging  eyes  of  his  our  every  movement.    There  was 
something  uncanny  in  this  sense  of  being  watched, 
and  I  pictured  those  eyes  as  cold,  cruel,  and  deeply 
malignant. 

We  went  back  by  the  road  we  had  come.  It  was 
nearing  sunset  when  we  came  to  the  last  bend  of  the 
road  from  which  we  saw  the  Fruitvale  Lake.  The 
sun  was  shining  on  it ;  evidently  the  storm  had  passed 
over  Fruitvale,  or  had  touched  it  only  with  its  fringes. 
And  over  the  northward  end  of  the  lake  there  was 
a  vast  span  of  rainbow.  It  rose  like  a  bridge  of  light, 
uniting  the  two  shores,  built  of  jewelled  splendour.  It 
came  like  a  beautiful  climax  to  all  that  we  had  seen. 
It  was  like  the  soft  diminishing  harmony  of  a  great 


THE  WAR  EAGLE  93 

orchestra,  the  viohn  and  haq)  after  the  loud  blare 
of  drums  and  trumpets. 

About  a  mile  from  Fruitvale  we  came  to  Morri- 
son's humble  shack. 

He  was  standing  at  the  door  with  a  paper  in  his 
hands.  Among  the  flowers  in  his  garden  his  little 
girl  was  playing. 

"What's  the  news?"  we  shouted. 

He  came  towards  us  waving  the  paper,  and  we  no- 
ticed that  his  face  was  pale  and  serious. 

"Terrible  news,"  he  said.  "Yesterday  war  was  de- 
clared between  Great  Britain  and  Germany." 

It  was  the  fifth  day  of  August.  While  we  had 
been  hidden  in  the  sanctuary  of  the  mountains  the 
whole  world  had  burst  into  flame. 

The  War-eagle,  with  his  cruel,  cold,  malignant  eyes, 
had  left  his  eyrie,  and  was  abroad  above  the  nations. 

As  for  the  Rainbow,  that  had  vanished.  The  Eagle 
was  sole  lord  of  that  wide  sky,  where  the  clouds  were 
gathering  with  the  presage  of  a  night  of  tempest. 


CHAPTER  II 
NEW  YORK 


"You  must  be  neutral  in  word  and  thought,"  were 
the  first  words  that  greeted  me  when  I  returned  to 
New  York  in  September. 

They  were  upon  the  Hps  of  every  one.  They  defined 
a  national  attitude.  I  read  them  in  the  newspapers, 
heard  them  reiterated  in  the  pulpits,  found  them  cur- 
rent among  my  friends.  No  one  stopped  to  ask 
whether  it  was  possible  to  be  neutral  in  thought.  No 
one  was  courageous  or  keen-witted  enough  to  point 
out  that  the  man  who  refuses  to  stand  on  the  side 
of  any  defined  principle  has  by  that  very  refusal  taken 
sides  against  it.  The  words  were  a  convenient  for- 
mula under  which  moral  apathy  and  intellectual  in- 
competence found  cover. 

New  York  betrayed  by  no  outward  sign  her  con- 
sciousness of  world  catastrophe.  Groups  of  people 
gathered  round  the  newspaper  offices,  scanning  the 
bulletins  of  battles,  but  they  were  not  larger  and  were 
much  less  eager  than  the  crowds  who  studied  the  re- 
sults of  a  baseball  game.  The  restaurants  were 
thronged,  the  theatres  in  full  swing.     The  night-life 

94 


NEW  YORK  95 

of  the  city  flowed  upon  its  course  with  even  more 
than  its  old  glitter,  gaiety,  profusion  and  reckless  quest 
of  pleasure.  Her  Babylonic  towers  sprang  fire- 
crowned,  flame-garlanded,  into  the  affronted  skies; 
her  voice  rose  up  into  the  night  strong  and  clamant, 
passionate  and  self-sufficient.  I  had  expected,  at  the 
least,  a  new  gravity  in  men's  thoughts :  I  found  instead 
a  deliberate  intention  to  avoid  gravity,  to  turn  the 
eyes  away  from  the  vision  of  tragic  realities. 

There  had  been  some  days  of  real  consternation 
in  New  York,  so  I  gathered,  when  war  broke  out. 
Stocks  had  dropped  and  there  was  general  apprehen- 
sion. But  the  lords  of  finance  had  been  quick  to  rec- 
ognise in  Europe's  extremity  America's  opportunity. 
I  found  in  the  newspapers  cheerful  forecasts  of  the 
inevitable  wealth  that  awaited  neutral  nations.  The 
part  of  America  appeared  to  be  to  sell  her  resources 
to  the  highest  bidder.  The  more  impoverished  Eu- 
rope grew  the  wealthier  would  America  become.  Of 
course  America  was  not  glad  because  Europe  was  at 
war,  but  it  was  not  America's  fault  if  war  enriched 
her.  And,  besides,  would  not  America  play  the  part 
of  a  real  benefactor  if  she  fed  and  armed  the  Allied 
nations?  Was  not  that  a  high  and  holy  duty?  And 
if  the  path  of  duty  was  the  way  of  profit,  so  much 
the  better  for  America. 

Put  in  this  way,  the  argument  appears  both  base 
and  hypocritical,  but  it  must  be  said  that  very  few 
people  recognised  its  real  character  in  the  Fall  of  1914. 
It  appeared  to  be  the  verdict  of  sound  sense,  and  was 
none  the  worst  because  it  coincided  with  natural  self- 


96  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ishness.  But  its  ethical  effect  was  disastrous.  It 
ignored  the  moral  issues  involved.  It  ignored  the  fact 
that  America,  not  less  than  England,  was  morally 
pledged  to  the  defence  of  Belgium.  It  concentrated 
the  mind  of  the  people  on  self -advantage,  and  sanc- 
tioned this  attitude  by  the  counsel  to  be  neutral  in  word 
and  thought. 

The  first  person  I  met  on  my  return  to  New  York 
was  Herridge,  the  editor  of  the  Magazine  in  which 
several  of  my  stories  had  appeared.  I  had  always 
liked  Herridge,  perhaps  because  he  had  shown  a  more 
than  common  liking  for  me.  He  was  a  tall  man, 
approaching  middle-age,  with  tired  but  keen  eyes  un- 
der heavy  brows,  and  a  firm  humorous  mouth.  On 
my  appearance  in  his  office,  he  hustled  out  an  artist 
who  was  showing  him  cover  designs,  dismissed  his 
typist,  and  drew  up  his  chair  for  a  chat,  with  a  sig- 
nificant glance,  however,  at  his  watch,  which  he  placed 
conspicuously  on  his  desk. 

"Ten  minutes,"  I  laughed.     "I  understand." 
"No,"  he  said  quizzically,  "fifteen.     I  make  a  spe- 
cial allowance  for  returned  wanderers  from  the  wil- 
derness, where,  I  believe,  time  has  no  value.     Well, 
what  have  you  brought  me?    A  new  story?" 
"I  am  working  on  one.    It's  about  half  done." 
"Good  boy.     I've  observed  that  most  men  who  say 
they  go  into  the  wilderness  to  write,  do  nothing  of 
the  kind.     They  simply  loaf.     And  I'll  tell  you  an- 
other thing;   the  best  stories  are  always  written  in 
cities.     Nature's  too  distracting." 


NEW  YORK  97 

"I  didn't  find  Nature  distracting,  but  certainly  the 


war  is." 


"I  don't  see  why,  it  isn't  our  war." 

"But  it's  such  a  big  thing  it's  bound  to  effect  us 
all.  I  should  think  it  would  affect  the  circulation 
of  the  magazines." 

"It  will,  but  not  in  the  way  you  think.  I  thought 
at  first  that  it  would  smash  us.  But  I've  seen  a  great 
light.     It'll  do  just  the  opposite,  I  believe." 

"You  mean,  it'll  give  you  all  sorts  of  new  mate- 
rial, war-stories  and  so  forth?" 

"No,  that's  just  what  I  don't  mean.  This  is  the 
situation,  as  I  see  it.  The  papers  will  be  full  of  war- 
material,  of  course,  and  they'll  very  soon  overdo  it. 
People  will  get  tired  of  it,  and  that's  where  the  maga- 
zine will  score.  I  shall  go  on  giving  the  public  the 
best  fiction  I  can,  but  not  a  word  about  the  war.  I 
reckon  the  general  reader  will  soon  be  so  sick  of  war- 
stuff  that  he'll — perhaps  I  should  say  she'll — turn  with 
a  new  appetite  to  the  table  I  spread.  The  old  menu, 
you  know ;  love,  youth,  marriage,  a  little  delicate  skirt- 
ing of  sex-problems,  but  not  much,  a  good  detective 
story  now  and  then,  and  just  a  soupgon  of  verse." 

"But  don't  you  think  that  this  intelligent  general 
reader  of  yours  will  want  you  at  least  to  show  him 
you're  aware  there  is  a  war?" 

"My  dear  fellow,  the  general  reader  doesn't  know 
there's  a  war,  and  he  doesn't  want  to  know.  I've  been 
in  the  middle  West  this  summer,  and,  believe  me,  not 
one  person  in  ten  ever  mentioned  the  war  to  me,  and 


98  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

the  one  who  did  wouldn't  have  done  it  unless  I'd  in- 
troduced the  subject." 

"Well,  all  I  can  say  is  that  it's  a  most  extraor- 
dinary condition  of  thought,  or  lack  of  thought." 

"Not  at  all.  It's  perfectly  natural.  The  people  have 
been  told  on  the  highest  authority  to  be  neutral  in 
word  and  thought,  and  that's  just  what  they're  do- 
ing. The  way  they  interpret  that  very  sane  counsel 
is  just  to  go  on  doing  the  things  they've  been  accus- 
tomed to  do — including,  I  hope,  reading  my  maga- 


zine." 


"But  you  don't  take  that  view,  do  you?" 
"I  don't  know  but  what  I  do. 

'Ours  not  to  reason  why, 
Ours  but  to  swat  the  fly.' 

By  the  way,  that's  one  of  George  Henson's  jokes.  He 
got  off  a  screed  on  it  in  Maclean's  the  other  day,  the 
effect  of  which  was  we're  wiser  looking  after  our 
own  small  moral  sanitations  than  puddling  in  the  gar- 
bage pails  of  Europe." 

He  looked  at  his  watch  significantly,  and  I  rose 
to  go. 

"No,  don't  go,"  he  said.  "I  haven't  seen  you  for 
a  long  time,  and  I  should  really  like  a  long  talk  with 
you.  Especially  as  you  don't  seem  to  have  the  New 
York  point  of  view  about  things,  and  it's  essential 
you  should  get  it  as  soon  as  possible." 

"It  doesn't  seem  to  me,  from  what  you've  said.  New 
York  has  got  a  point  of  view.    It's  simply  blind." 

"Now  don't  go  off  at  a  tangent,  there's  a  good  fel- 


NEW  YORK 


99 


low.  There  may  be  more  wisdom  in  blindness  than 
you  think.  Didn't  one  of  your  own  heroes,  Nelson, 
use  his  blind  eye  upon  things  he  didn't  want  to  see?" 

"He  was  blind  to  peril.    America's " 

"O  yes,  I  know  what  you're  going  to  say.  And 
I  don't  want  you  to  start  saying  that  kind  of  thing, 
because  it  won't  do  any  good,  and  it  will  do  you  great 
harm.  I'll  tell  you  what,  come  to  lunch  with  me  at 
the  Rochambeau.  We'll  meet  a  lot  of  the  other  fel- 
lows there,  and  you'll  hear  what  they  have  to  say. 
Just  amuse  yourself  for  ten  minutes — I've  an  adver- 
tising man  to  see.     I'll  be  back  on  time." 

When  Herridge  left  the  room  I  went  to  the  lofty 
window,  and  looked  out  on  the  vast  confused  mag- 
nificence of  New  York.  It  lay  far  beneath  me,  a  med- 
ley of  stony  gulches,  fissures  and  canyons,  pinnacles 
and  precipices,  a  thing  so  tremendous  in  its  brutal 
indifference  to  beauty,  its  assertion  of  savage  strength, 
its  complete  dedication  to  utility,  that  I  ceased  to  won- 
der at  its  complacency.  Here  and  there  the  eye  dis- 
tinguished the  spire  or  dome  that  signified  a  spiritual 
ideal,  but  these  spires  and  domes  were  everywhere 
out-soared  and  over-topped  by  the  towers  of  com- 
merce. I  reflected  that  in  a  European  city  it  was  the 
Cathedral  and  the  Campanile  that  dominated  all  lesser 
buildings;  here  it  was  the  Metropolitan  Life  tower, 
and  the  towers  that  bore  the  names  of  Singer  and 
Woolworth.  How  could  a  city  so  conceived  be  quick 
to  respond  to  an  unselfish  idealism?  And  beyond 
these  intricate  lanes  of  houses,  along  which  men  moved 
like  ants,  there  gleamed  the  salt  water — no  narrow 


100  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

channel  over  which  an  air-man  could  fly,  but  leagues 
on  leagues  of  ocean,  separating  worlds.  What  won- 
der that  the  men  of  this  ultimate  city,  so  powerful 
and  so  isolated,  should  be  incapable  of  recognising 
any  menace  of  peril,  or  any  thin  voice  of  appealing 
comradeship  that  came  as  a  mere  whisper  across  the 
empty  spaces  of  three  thousand  miles  of  sea? 

Herridge  interrupted  my  reflections  with  his  cheer- 
ful invocation,  "Come  along  to  lunch,"  and  we  went 
down  the  elevator  to  the  crowded  streets.  We  walked 
down  lower  Fifth  Avenue  to  the  Rochambeau  and 
found  the  usual  crowd  in  the  dining-room.  Life  was 
certainly  unaltered  here.  I  recognised  the  same  faces 
at  the  same  tables.  The  lager  foamed  in  the  tall 
glasses,  corks  popped,  blue  smoke  arose  from  cigars 
and  cigarettes,  eager  conversations  were  in  process, 
gay  hats  nodded,  and  there  was  the  swish  of  women's 
dresses  and  the  delicate  ripple  of  women's  laughter 
on  the  air.  Alphonse,  my  favourite  waiter,  hurried 
to  greet  me,  assiduously  cheerful.  I  remembered  that 
he  was  French,  and  asked  him  what  he  thought  about 
the  war. 

"It  will  be  over  by  Christmas,  Monsieur." 

"Will  you  have  to  go?" 

"There  will  be  no  need.  The  Germans,  they  are 
already  in  retreat.  No,  Monsieur,  it  will  be  over  by 
Christmas." 

At  the  table  next  to  mine,  I  recognised  a  young  fel- 
low who  was  employed  in  the  Russian  Consular  serv- 
ice. He  had  heard  the  remark  of  Alphonse,  and 
nodded  his  head  in  pleased  assent. 


NEW  YORK  lOT 

"We  shall  be  in  Berlin  by  Christmas,"  he  said.  "It 
is  beyond  doubt." 

"You  hear,"  said  Herridge,  as  we  sat  down  to 
our  meal.     "I  am  of  the  same  opinion." 

Herridge  chose  the  lunch  with  the  meticulous  care 
which  was  characteristic  of  him.  He  was  by  no  means 
a  gourmand;  but  he  had  a  cultivated  taste  in  food 
and  drink,  and  to-day  he  took  special  pains  to  please 
me.  I  had  remarked  long  ago  that  when  he  did  this 
he  usually  had  some  ulterior  motive  connected  with 
his  magazine,  and  by  the  time  we  reached  our  coffee 
I  found  his  motive. 

"How  much  have  you  done  of  your  new  novel?" 
he  asked  abruptly. 

"About  half — something  like  sixty  thousand  words." 

"Well,"  he  said,  "I'm  going  to  make  you  a  propo- 
sition. I'll  tell  you  frankly  that  I  expected  a  serial 
from  Grandison.  I  had  the  contract  all  ready  for 
signature,  but  what  must  Grandison  do  but  go  off  as 
special  correspondent  for  the  Day-Star.  He  begged 
me  to  let  him  off.  It  was  very  annoying,  but  of  course 
I  had  no  option.  But  that  leaves  me  stranded.  Here's 
the  point.  Let  me  see  your  manuscript,  and  if  I  find 
it's  at  all  what  I  expect  it  to  be,  I'll  be  glad  to  sign 
up  with  you." 

"But  suppose  I  want  to  go  as  war-correspondent 
too.     I've  thought  of  it." 

"My  dear  fellow,  please  put  that  idea  out  of  your 
head.  Your  talent  is  much  too  rare  to  throw  away 
on  such  a  job  as  that.  I'm  not  flattering  you — I  don't 
flatter  anybody,  but  you  can't  help  knowing  that  your 


I02  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

work  is  unusually  good.  At  all  events,  I  know  it. 
Besides,  you  have  heard  my  opinion  about  the  war, 
and  it  is  the  opinion  of  most  sensible  men.  It'll  be 
over  by  Christmas.  Germany  can't  possibly  stand  out 
for  long  against  the  great  forces  arrayed  against  her. 
It  would  be  poor  business  for  you  to  throw  up  all 
your  prospects  in  New  York  to  go  off  as  war-corre- 
spondent, only  to  find  you  got  to  France  too  late  to 
see  anything  of  the  fighting." 

"Of  course,  if  I  thought  that " 

"There's  every  reason  why  you  should  think  it. 
And,  if  .you  won't  be  offended,  I  should  like  to  add 
that  I'm  really  giving  you  a  chance  that  doesn't  come 
very  often  to  a  young  writer." 

"I  know  that.  And,  believe  me,  I  appreciate  your 
kindness." 

"Well,  it  isn't  kindness  altogether.  An  editor  has 
to  be  guided  by  self-interest,  and  I'm  not  ashamed  to 
say  I  need  you  badly.  If  you  fail  me,  I  don't  know 
where  to  turn.  And,  look  here;  if  I  find  your  story 
suits  me — and  I've  no  doubt  it  will — I'll  give  you  just 
the  same  terms  I  would  have  given  Grandison.  You 
know  what  they  are :  he  gets  a  price  as  high  as  any- 
body in  the  front  rank." 

I  will  confess  that  I  was  a  little  amazed  at  this 
sudden  good-fortune.  Herridge  had  always  been 
friendly  to  me,  and  his  interest  in  my  work  was  sin- 
cere. He  had  cheerfully  taken  short  stories  from 
me,  but  I  had  never  expected  he  would  accept  a  serial 
novel — at  least,  for  several  years.    To  step  into  Gran- 


NEW  YORK  103 

dison's  place  was  to  receive  the  accolade  of  magazine- 
dom. 

Yet  there  was  one  disturbing  thought  that  con- 
fronted me.  Suppose,  after  all,  this  confident  opinion 
that  the  war  would  end  by  Christmas  proved  false. 
How  should  I  then  stand  with  a  contract  for  an  un- 
completed story  on  my  hands  ?  Apart  from  any  ques- 
tion of  work  as  a  war-correspondent,  which  had  been 
a  vague  hope  rather  than  a  fixed  intention,  might  not 
circumstances  arise  which  would  make  the  fulfilment 
of  my  contract  difficult,  if  not  impossible? 

"Don't  think  I'm  ungrateful;  I'm  profoundly  grate- 
ful," I  said.  "But  I  think  you'll  understand  me  when 
I  say  that  I  rather  shrink  from  signing  a  contract  for 
a  story  that  is  in  large  part  unwritten." 

"That  needn't  bother  you,"  he  answered  cheerfully. 
"They  all  do  it." 

"But  I'm  a  very  slow  worker." 

"How  slow?" 

"Well,  allowing  that  I'm  about  half  through  my 
novel,  I've  sixty  thousand  words  still  to  write,  and 
I  should  want  six  months  at  least. 

"And  what's  the  trouble?  You've  got  six  months, 
haven't  you?" 

"If  the  war  doesn't  interfere  with  my  plans." 

"O,  damn  the  war,"  he  said  with  a  gesture  of  anger. 
"We're  in  America,  thank  God,  and  we  are  free  to  live 
our  own  lives.  I  have  to  edit  my  magazine,  and  you 
have  to  write  your  stories.  I'm  giving  you  a  chance 
to  do  your  best  work  in  a  way  that  will  attract  the 
most  attention.     I'm  not  afraid  to  take  your  story 


104  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

half -written,  and  I  don't  see  why  you  should  hesitate. 
On  your  own  showing  all  you  want  is  six  months  for 
the  work.  Well,  take  that  six  months.  It's  not  much 
in  a  life,  but  it  may  mean  a  lot  to  you.  Take  it,  and 
let  the  world  go  hang.  I  tell  you  what  I'd  do,  if  I 
had  the  power:  I'd  lock  you  up  in  a  room  for  six 
months,  like  Daudet's  father  did,  and  give  you  pen  and 
ink,  and  let  you  hear  not  a  word  from  the  outside 
world  till  you'd  done.  Some  day  I'll  get  a  law  intro- 
duced in  Congress,  allowing  editors  to  kidnap  prom- 
ising authors  in  the  interests  of  literature,  with  per- 
missive powers  to  thrash  them  if  they  fail  to  write 
less  than  five  hundred  words  a  day." 

We  rose  from  the  table,  laughing,  and  went  out 
into  the  brilliant  sunshine  of  the  Avenue, 

"Send  your  manuscript  to  me  to-night  and  come  to 
the  office  to-morrow  at  noon,"  he  said,  "I  must  taxi 
back  now  as  fast  as  I  can,  for  I've  a  pile  of  work 
waiting.     Don't  fail  me." 

"All  right,  I'll  be  there.  And  thank  you,  once 
more." 

"We'll  postpone  our  grace  till  after  meat.  It  will 
be  time  enough  to  return  thanks  when  the  contract  is 
signed." 

As  he  stepped  into  the  taxi  he  turned  to  me  and  said 
again,  "Don't  fail  me.     No  excuses,  you  know," 

I  was  aware  of  a  certain  veiled  menace  in  his  tone. 
With  all  his  kindliness  of  disposition  there  was  a  defi- 
nite hardness  in  Herridge  which  I  had  recognised  long 
ago.  It  was  one  of  the  qualities,  perhaps  the  chief,  to 
which  he  owed  his  brilliant  success.     He  knew  how  to 


NEW  YORK  105 

impose  his  will  on  others,  not  in  any  bullying  way  but 
by  firm  continuous  pressure.  He  could  be  very  pa- 
tient in  this  species  of  compulsion,  but  if  it  failed  he 
could  be  quite  ruthless  in  discarding  those  who  did 
not  yield  to  it.  I  had  known  him  labour  with  in- 
defatigable patience  and  good  humour  with  a  writer 
to  get  him  to  alter  his  story  in  such  a  way  as  to  suit 
the  ideals  of  the  Magazine;  but  if  his  efforts  failed 
he  never  gave  the  delinquent  another  chance.  From 
that  hour  the  Magazine  was  closed  to  him,  however 
good  his  work  might  be.  And  so  I  knew  quite  well 
what  that  little  parting  phrase,  "No  excuses,"  meant 
for  me.  I  must  take  the  chance  he  gave  me,  or  make 
up  my  mind  to  incur  not  precisely  his  enmity  but  a 
perfectly  civil,  though  quite  positive,  ostracism  at  his 
hands. 

"Well,  I  have  till  to-morrow  anyway  to  consider 
it,"  I  reflected. 

The  great  Avenue  stretched  before  me,  brilliant  in 
the  autumn  glow,  a  great  river  of  life  flowing  be- 
tween high  windowed  cliffs,  and  in  the  long  distance 
a  bluish  mist  such  as  one  sees  on  rivers  in  golden  after- 
noons. The  fascination  of  the  city,  which  I  had 
thought  broken,  came  on  me  afresh ;  that  subtle  magic 
born  out  of  the  sense  of  multitude,  of  thronged  lives 
each  with  its  own  drama,  of  relentless  forces  which 
wove  and  rewove  with  tireless  artistry  the  woof  of 
human  destinies.  I  yielded  to  the  magic  and  found 
pleasure  in  it.  And,  in  this  yielding,  there  was  the 
sense  that  somehow  my  own  humble  destiny  was  be- 
ing shaped  by  unseen  forces. 


io6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 


II 


I  had  intended  looking  up  some  of  the  men  I  knew, 
and  dining  witli  them  at  the  Rochambeau  that  night, 
but  about  five  o'clock  a  message  reached  me  from  my 
publisher,  old  Mr.  Trafiford,  asking  me  to  dine  with 
him  at  his  house. 

Mr.  Trafford  was  a  remarkable  man,  for  whom  I 
had  an  affection  almost  filial.  He  had  written  a  great 
deal  himself  and  had  a  very  delicate  and  discerning 
sense  of  literary  values.  With  him,  publishing  was 
less  a  trade  than  a  vocation,  to  which  he  brought 
very  high  ideals.  He  was  now  an  old  man,  but  still 
erect,  active  and  very  much  in  love  with  life.  His 
fine  grey  head,  dark  deep-set  eyes  under  bushy  brows, 
and  keen  intellectual  face  would  have  attracted  atten- 
tion anywhere.  He  looked  what  he  was,  a  thinker, 
who  had  parted  with  many  illusions,  not  indeed  with- 
out sadness,  but  without  the  customary  reaction  to- 
wards cynicism — a  thinker  who  has  lost  faiths  without 
losing  faith. 

I  wish  I  could  convey  more  clearly  the  impression 
made  on  me  by  Henry  Trafford.  It  is  relatively  easy 
to  catalogue  his  qualities, — his  genial  wisdom,  his 
large  tolerance,  his  humility  and  gentleness,  and  so 
forth :  but  a  catalogue  of  qualities  is  not  a  character. 
The  truth  is  there  was  something  subtle  in  theVnan, 
a  spiritual  element,  an  effluence  of  personality,  rare, 
elusive,  not  definable,  yet  always  felt  by  all  who  came 
in  contact  with  him.  He  was  an  eager  and  brilliant 
talker,  yet  I  never  knew  him  talk  for  display.     He 


NEW  YORK  107 

knew  more  about  Babylonian  cuneiform  inscriptions 
than  many  men  who  were  justly  ranked  as  experts, 
but  he  never  spoke  of  them.  He  would  sometimes 
sit  silent  during  an  entire  evening  while  younger  men 
talked,  and  yet  when  the  evening  ended  one  came 
away  with  an  impression  of  his  wisdom,  the  sense  of 
a  rare  distinction  in  him  which  all  the  others  lacked. 
His  patience  toward  the  younger  men  whom  he  loved 
to  gather  round  him  was  quite  beautiful.  He  treated 
them  with  more  than  consideration,  with  an  implied 
belief  in  their  talents  which  drew  forth  the  best  in 
them.  In  short,  Henry  Trafford  was,  in  the  most 
exacting  sense  of  the  word,  a  great  gentleman,  whose 
fineness  was  the  perfect  equipoise  of  many  rare  and 
great  qualities,  which  reposed  upon  a  base  of  solid 
strength  and  long  experience. 

The  house  in  which  he  lived  was  one  of  the  old 
New  York  houses  to  the  east  of  Madison  Avenue.  It 
was  narrow,  dark,  and  a  little  dingy — a  house  whose 
best  days  were  over.  His  family  had  often  urged 
him  to  move  to  a  more  fashionable  neighbourhood,  or 
accept  the  New  York  substitute  for  a  home  in  one 
of  the  great  apartment  houses  which  were  rapidly 
encroaching  on  the  neighbourhood,  but  he  had  been 
obdurate  to  these  appeals.  Forty  years  of  residence 
in  the  old  house  had  made  him  insensible  to  its  de- 
fects, and  had  endeared  it  to  him  by  many  associations. 
In  the  large  front  room  on  the  first  floor,  which  he 
used  as  his  library,  he  had  written  much;  and  he  had 
a  superstition,  common  among  writers,  that  he  could 
write  nowhere  else.    He  used  to  say,  in  his  jesting  way 


io8  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

which  disguised  serious  conviction,  that  the  ghosts  of 
a  thousand  thoughts  haunted  this  room,  that  it  had 
a  kind  of  aura  of  its  own,  that  wise  men  and  great 
thinkers  whispered  together  in  its  corners,  and  were 
eager  to  communicate  their  wisdom  to  him  when  he 
sat  down  to  write.  Certainly  many  men  of  letters, 
whose  names  were  famous,  had  foregathered 
there,  and  in  their  midnight  conversations  many  a 
book  had  been  bom.  This  room  was  the  sanctuary 
of  the  house,  but  all  the  other  rooms  were  in  keep- 
ing with  it.  Simplicity  and  austerity  were  the  notes 
of  the  entire  house.  There  was  no  furniture  that 
was  not  necessary,  but  it  was  all  good,  solid  and  old- 
fashioned.  The  floors  were  bare  and  highly  polished; 
rugs  and  carpets  were  absent;  an  old-fashioned  silver 
candelabra  still  lit  his  dining  table,  and  the  only  pic- 
tures on  the  walls  were  portraits  of  his  parents,  per- 
sonal friends  and  literary  celebrities. 

He  received  me  with  his  usual  courtesy,  and  imme- 
diately after  dinner  we  adjourned  to  his  library.  Al- 
though the  night  was  warm,  a  cheerful  fire  of  logs 
crackled  on  the  hearth,  and  a  small  table,  with  a 
spirit  stand  and  cigars,  was  drawn  up  before  it. 

"And  now,  my  dear  boy,"  he  said,  *T  want  you  to 
talk  to  me  about  yourself.  And  first  of  all  tell  me 
what  you  have  been  writing  during  the  summer." 

I  gave  him  a  scenario  of  my  story,  at  some  length, 
and,  of  course,  told  him  of  the  offer  I  had  had  that 
day  from  Herridge. 

"Well,  let's  take  the  story  first.  I  see  it  is  a  love- 
story,  and  that's  all  right.     A  love-story  is  the  only 


NEW  YORK  109" 

kind  of  story  that  fascinates  all  kinds  of  people,  be- 
cause the  relation  between  a  man  and  a  woman  is 
the  only  theme  of  enduring  interest.  Even  to  an 
old  fellow  like  myself  a  love-story  is  always  fascinat- 
ing, partly,  I  suppose,  because  I've  never  got  beyond 
the  child's  trick  of  romantic  make-believe,  the  habit 
of  imagining  myself  in  romantic  situations.  And 
there's  another  reason  too,  which  perhaps  you  won't 
appreciate — we  old  fellows  are  sometimes  dreadfully 
afraid  that  we've  missed  the  highest  possibilities  of 
love,  and  we  want  to  see  if  you  young  fellows  can 
tell  us  anything  we  don't  know." 

"What  you  don't  know,  we  are  not  likely  to  dis- 
cover," I  replied. 

"That  does  not  follow  at  all.  Man  grows  more 
curiously  intricate  with  each  generation,  and  finds 
new  modes  of  expression.  Browning,  for  example, 
was  a  much  more  intricate  personality  than  Scott,  and 
he  loved  in  a  way  impossible  to  Scott.  Love  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  and  love  among  early  Victorians, 
was  a  very  different  business  from  love  with  the  Ros- 
settis  and  the  Swinburnes. 

"However,  that's  not  what  I  really  v/ant  to  say," 
he  continued.  "I  want  to  say  something  that  may 
perhaps  offend  you,  though  I  hope  it  won't.  I  want 
to  tell  you  that  I'm  not  at  all  satisfied  with  the  mate- 
rial of  your  work,  though  the  work  itself  is  so  fine 
that  I  truly  admire  it." 

"You  mean  the  sort  of  people  I  picture." 

"Yes,  just  that.  You  see,  they're  essentially  little 
people.     They  live  in  New  York,  which  with  all  its 


no  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

boast  of  bigness  contains  more  little  people  to  the 
acre  than  any  other  city  in  the  world." 

"All  great  cities  contain  multitudes  of  little  people, 
don't  they?" 

"Undoubtedly.  But  New  York  has  a  larger  pro- 
portion of  them,  because  New  York  hasn't  got  what 
so  many  European  cities  have,  a  big  historic  back- 
ground. I  rather  think  the  meanest  Londoner  has  a 
sense  of  empire :  he's  reminded  of  it  in  all  he  sees. 
And  Paris  has  a  dominant  note  of  art  as  well  as 
empire.  Great  minds  are  in  it,  and  men  in  general 
know  they  are  there.  There  are  immemorial  adora- 
tions, ideals,  traditions,  which  create  wide  visions, 
large  passions.  The  big  men  of  New  York  are  not  the 
thinkers  or  the  artists — they  are  the  millionaires.  In 
London  the  first  place  they  take  the  stranger  to  is 
Westminster  Abbey,  in  Paris  it  is  the  Pantheon,  or 
perhaps  the  house  of  Victor  Hugo:  in  New  York  it's 
upper  Fifth  Avenue,  and  the  abnormal  architectural 
monstrosities  of  the  money-kings.  Do  you  see  what 
I  mean  ?  The  writer  who  sets  his  scene  in  New  York 
misses  the  inspiration  of  the  only  ideals  that  endure 
and  are  worth  anything?" 

"Herridge  jumped  at  my  story  just  because  it  was 
laid  in  New  York,"  I  replied. 

"He  would.  He  knows  nothing  better,  and  if  you 
tried  him  with  something  better  and  bigger  he 
wouldn't  understand  it.  He's  an  editor,  which  means 
a  caterer,  and  he  has  to  consider  the  taste  of  his 
clients." 

"Isn't  the  literary  man  also  a  caterer?     He  must 


NEW  YORK  III 

comply  with  the  taste  of  his  time  if  he  wants  to  be 
read  at  all." 

"The  literary  man,  yes.  The  man  of  letters,  the 
true  artist,  no.  And,  my  dear  boy,  I've  had  hopes 
that  it  is  with  the  latter,  not  the  former,  that  you 
belong." 

"Then  you  would  wish  me  to  refuse  Herridge's 
offer?" 

"No.  I  wouldn't  say  that.  The  story  is  written, 
and  you  may  as  well  do  the  best  you  can  with  it.  But 
what  I  want  you  to  see  is  that  you  ought  to  be  doing 
better  things.  You  ought  to  take  yourself  seriously, 
and  do  work  that  is  serious.  And  I  have  a  special 
reason  for  saying  this." 

"What's  the  reason?" 

"The  times  in  which  we  live.  The  whole  world  is 
changing.  This  awful  war  is  going  to  alter  all  the 
values  of  both  life  and  literature.  We're  only  at  the 
beginning  of  it.  Before  it  is  over,  the  world,  as  we 
know  it,  will  have  disappeared,  and  we  shall  have  to 
begin  all  over  again.  And  depend  upon  it,  you  writers 
will  have  to  write  in  a  new  way.  Love-stories  will  be 
written  in  a  new  way.  They  won't  be  trivial  flirta- 
tions and  whisperings  behind  the  palms  at  fashionable 
dances.  They  won't  be  the  sensual  escapades  of  much- 
married  adventurers.  They'll  be  as  serious  as  sacri- 
fice and  as  solemn  as  death !" 

He  rose,  walked  across  the  room,  unlocked  a  drawer 
in  an  old-fashioned  bureau,  and  came  back  to  me  with 
a  tarnished  brass  button  in  his  hand. 

"Do  you  know  what  that  is?"  he  asked. 


112  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

It  had  stamped  on  it  an  eagle,  and  on  the  reverse 
side  were  the  words,  "Hyde  and  Gourien,  New  Or- 
leans." 

"That  is  a  Confederate  button,"  he  said.  "I  cut  it 
off  the  uniform  of  my  best  friend  as  he  lay  dying  at 
Gettysburg.  I  fought  under  Robert  Lee,  and  he  was 
the  greatest  man  I  ever  knew.  If  Lee  were  alive  now 
and  called  me  to  the  same  conflict,  I  think  I  should 

go." 

He  raised  the  button  to  his  lips,  and  put  it  back  again 

in  the  bureau. 

"I  don't  want  you  to  think,  however,  that  I'm  not 
a  good  American  to-day,"  he  continued.  "I've  long 
ago  been  satisfied  with  the  result  of  that  contest,  though 
my  side  lost.  But  what  I  do  want  to  say  is  this:  I 
saw  the  whole  life  of  America  dissolve  in  the  great 
war,  and  a  new  America  arise.  The  old  easy  forms 
of  life  disappeared,  and  they  returned  no  more.  War 
never  leaves  things  as  they  were.  This  is  going  to  be 
a  far  vaster  war,  and  I  know  that  it  will  change  every- 
thing." 

"Then  you  don't  think  it  will  be  brief?" 

"I  don't.  I  think  it  will  be  long  and  terrible.  I 
think  before  it  is  over  we  shall  all  be  in  it.  It  will 
attract  all  the  haters  of  freedom  on  the  one  side,  and  all 
the  lovers  of  freedom  on  the  other.    It  can  do  no  less." 

"In  that  case,  I  should  have  to  go." 

"I  know  that.  I'm  glad  you  know  it.  But  don't 
be  hasty.  If  the  call  comes  to  you,  be  sure  of  it,  it 
will  come  in  a  way  that  permits  no  denial.    My  most 


NEW  YORK  113 

earnest  counsel  to  you  is,  wait  for  that  hour — don't 
rush  toward  it." 

He  put  his  arm  round  my  shoulders,  as  though  he 
were  a  father  defending  his  son  from  danger.  I  could 
not  but  notice  his  hand — the  long  fine,  blue-veined 
hand  of  the  scholar  and  the  artist — and  I  found  it 
difficult  to  imagine  that  it  had  ever  fired  a  gun  charged 
with  brutal  death.  Henry  Trafford,  so  gentle  and 
urbane,  flung  with  a  host  of  shouting  infuriated  men 
into  the  red  shambles  of  battle — firing  blindly  through 
the  smoke  with  the  rest,  hoarse  with  anger,  stooping 
with  the  sweat  and  blood  of  war  upon  his  face  to  cut 
the  button  from  the  stained  uniform  of  his  dying 
comrade,  kissing  it  perhaps  as  he  had  done  an  instant 
ago,  and  cursing  bitterly  as  he  kissed — the  picture 
seemed  incredible.  And,  as  if  he  read  my  thought,  he 
said  quietly,  "I  waited  till  I  had  to  go.  I  was  not  a 
coward,  but  I  knew  what  it  meant  to  my  mother  who 
was  a  widow,  and  I  waited  till  she  said  'Go.'  And  I 
knew  in  an  imperfect  way  that  all  the  fineness  of  the 
old  southern  life  was  doomed,  and  I  wanted  to  cling 
to  it  as  long  as  possible,  in  the  hope  that  perhaps,  after 
all,  some  miracle  would  save  it.  The  miracle  was  not 
wrought,  and  so  at  last  I  went  with  the  rest ;  and  when 
it  was  all  over  my  mother  was  dead,  and  my  only 

brother  was  dead,  too I  dream  of  it  still — the 

rage,  the  horror,  the  agony,  and  I  wake  with  a  sense 
of  defilement,  as  though  I  dripped  with  blood,  and  I 
find  my  lips  drawn  back  in  an  ugly  snarl,  like  a  wild 
beast's." 

"Yet  you  would  go  again,  in  the  same  occasion?" 


% 


114  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I  would,  because  the  horror  of  the  thing  is  the 
least  thing  about  it.  It's  my  physical  fastidiousness 
that  is  conscious  of  defilement.  But  deep  down  in  my- 
self I  know  that  my  soul  grew  virile  in  those  scenes. 
I  got  a  grip  on  the  big  things  of  life — God,  and  duty 
and  eternity.  Perhaps  this  is  the  kind  of  gain  which 
will  come  to  the  world  out  of  this  war — the  world  will 
find  its  soul  again.  And  the  writers  will  find  their 
souls  too." 

He  lit  a  cigar  and  sat  silently  smoking  for  some 
minutes.  Presently  he  said  with  a  smile,  "I'm  afraid 
I've  prosed  a  good  deal.  I  wanted  you  to  talk  about 
yourself,  and  I  find  I've  done  all  the  talking." 

"I  count  it  an  honour  that  you've  told  mc  so  much 
about  yourself,"  I  replied. 

"Well,  it's  true  I  don't  often  talk  about  that  part  of 
my  past  to  any  one,  but  I  wanted  you  to  know  it,  al- 
though I  can't  exactly  say  why.  I  think  my  real  rea- 
son must  have  been  just  to  let  you  know  that  when  I 
counselled  you  not  to  be  hasty  in  thinking  this  war 
concerns  you  personally,  you  might  understand  that  I 
was  not  what  you  young  fellows  call  a  slacker.  That's 
the  new  word,  isn't  it?" 

"No  one  would  think  of  using  such  a  word  to  you," 
I  protested. 

"O,  I  don't  know  about  that.  Human  nature  is 
rarely  generous  when  its  stronger  passions  are  aroused. 
You  may  hear  the  word  applied  to  yourself  presently 
by  some  young  hot-head  to  whom  war  is  merely  the 
most  thrilling  form  of  personal  adventure.  It  will 
require  a  good  deal  of  grace  to  go  on  your  way  in 


NEW  YORK  T15 

silence,  confident  of  your  own  motives — a  good  deal 
of  courage  too.  I  went  through  that  experience,  and 
I  don't  think  I  was  the  worse  soldier  when  the  hour 
really  came.  It's  because  I  remember  that  experience 
I  want  you  to  promise  me  something." 

"What  is  it?" 

"Only  this :  promise  me  to  take  no  step  without  con- 
sulting me.  Your  father's  dead,  and  all  your  folk  are 
in  England,  aren't  they  ?  I  would  like  you  to  treat  me 
as  your  father,  if  you  don't  mind.  I  have  one  quali- 
fication at  least  for  that  part,  I  love  you  very  sin- 
cerely, my  dear  boy." 

I  put  my  hand  in  his,  and  the  compact  was  made 
silently  between  us. 

Walking  back  to  my  rooms  that  night  under  a  clear^  >3? 
sky  full  of  stars,  I  got  for  the  first  time  a  sense  of 
the  deeper  pulsations  of  American  life — "the  soul 
of  the  machine,"  the  essential  spiritual  quality  that 
lay  behind  the  material  appearances.  Henry  Trafford 
represented  the  soul  of  America.  He  was  one  of  those 
who  had  fought  for  an  ideal.  It  was  of  little  conse- 
quence that  it  was  a  political  ideal  which  had  been 
proved  wrong;  right  or  wrong  it  had  the  power  of  in- 
spiring self-sacrifice.  Multitudes  of  men  had  been 
moved  by  the  same  kind  of  impulse.  Did  this  capacity 
for  dedication  to  an  ideal  still  exist?  Had  fifty  >ears 
of  prosperity  quite  extinguished  it?  I  could  not  be- 
lieve it  had.  The  soul  of  America  might  be  stifled 
under  the  dust  of  the  market  place,  but  it  would  yet  be 
a  soul  resurgent.  The  picture  seized  upon  my  mind 
of  a  vast  hemisphere  of  sand  over  which  hordes  of 


ii6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Arabs  ride  without  a  guess  at  the  buried  magnificence 
that  lay  beneath  their  feet;  and  of  a  wise  scholar  who 
rides  ones  day  on  the  same  beaten  track,  but  stops, 
saying,  "Dig  here;"  and  behold,  before  the  spades  of 
his  workers,  there  are  revealed  ancient  temples,  whose 
stones  were  worn  by  the  feet  of  holy  priests  and  de- 
vout worshippers,  and  whose  frescoes  are  still  fresh 
as  when  the  painter  flung  down  his  brush  forty  cen- 
turies ago.  Beneath  the  beaten  roads  of  American 
materialism  was  there  also  a  buried  magnificence,  a 
temple  with  a  shrine? 

"Neutral  in  word  and  thought" — that  surely  could 
not  represent  a  people  who  had  fought  for  liberty  at 
Lexington,  and  for  national  unity  at  Gettysburg.  It 
could  not  sum  up  the  real  spirit  of  a  people  whose 
enduring  heroes  were  Washington  and  Lincoln.  The 
phrase  ignored  the  hidden  temple  beneath  the  desert 
dust,  the  buried  magnificence  beneath  material  reality. 

I  had  heard  two  voices  speak  that  day.  The  first 
proclaimed  the  war  an  unmeaning  episode,  which 
would  be  soon  closed  and  forgotten.  The  second  rec- 
ognised in  it  a  clash  of  principles  which  were  so  con- 
tradictory that  they  divided  all  mankind  into  two 
camps.  Which  was  right?  Who  was  the  true  pro- 
phet, Herridge  with  his  facile  optimism,  declaring 
the  war  would  end  at  Christmas,  or  Trafford  with  his 
reluctant  intuition  that  it  held  forces  which  were  ir- 
reconcilable, forces  which  rallied  on  the  one  side  all 
lovers  of  liberty,  and  on  the  other  all  haters  of  free- 
dom? 

I  could  frame  no  definite  reply  to  these  questions. 


NEW  YORK  117 

Perhaps  no  reply  was  possible  save  that  which  time 
alone  could  give. 

After  all,  was  there  any  better  wisdom  than  to  wait 
for  this  reply  of  time? 

This  was  the  sum  of  Trafford's  counsel  to  me.  As 
I  went  to  bed  another  of  his  favourite  sayings  flashed 
across  my  mind — "Learn  to  take  short  views  of  life. 
One  can  always  see  the  next  step  without  troubling 
himself  about  the  far  horizon." 

The  thought  was  comforting,  and  it  rang  the  bell 
of  sleep  for  me. 

Ill 

The  next  day  was  Friday,  September  nth,  1914. 
At  eight  o'clock  there  was  a  knock  at  my  door,  and  I 
rose  to  find  the  morning  papers  lying  there.  I  opened 
the  Times,  and  the  first  words  that  met  my  eye  were 
"The  Germans  Defeated.  Their  Army  in  Full  Re- 
treat." 

From  the  press  telegrams,  communications  of  cor- 
respondents and  the  leading  article,  I  tried  to  gather 
the  full  significance  of  this  announcement.  From  the 
tangle  of  words  certain  vivid  pictures  emerged,  dra- 
matic and  unforgettable.  I  saw  this  immense  grey  host 
of  conquering  Germans  suddenly  arrested  as  a  wave 
is  arrested  and  dispersed  by  an  indomitable  rock.  Its 
numbers  were  never  less  than  eight  to  five,  yet  it  had 
failed.  One  correspondent  described  what  he  had  seen 
only  four  days  earlier  on  the  forenoon  of  September 
6th.    On  that  day  the  insignificant  figure  of  the  Kaiser 


ii8  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

was  clearly  discerned  upon  a  little  hill  almost  within 
range  of  the  French  gnns,  dressed  in  the  uniform  of 
the  white  Cuirassiers,  and  wearing  a  silver  helmet. 
Massed  to  right  and  left  of  him  was  a  brilliant  escort, 
waiting  the  word  to  conduct  him  into  Nancy.  That 
hour  of  triumph  never  came.  On  the  evening  of  Wed- 
nesday September  the  ninth,  Foch  discovered  the  weak- 
ness of  the  German  centre,  and  delivered  the  crushing 
blow  which  ended  the  battle  of  the  Marne.  The  beaten 
Kaiser  had  taken  refuge  in  Metz,  and  the  fruit  of  his 
insane  pride  was  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand 
German  dead  and  wounded.  Paris  was  saved.  France, 
whose  decadence  had  been  proclaimed  with  such  sanc- 
timonious unction  and  arrogant  contempt,  had  met  the 
Teuton  host  in  open  battle,  and  was  victor, 

I  read  and  re-read  these  fragmentary  details  of  the 
great  battle,  until  incredulity  gave  way  to  something 
that  resembled  awe.  "Eight  to  five,"  I  repeated,  "and 
those  the  best  trained  troops  in  Europe,  already  keyed 
up  to  the  highest  valour  by  a  victorious  invasion  and 
advance — how  could  it  have  happened?  The  whole 
story,  in  spite  of  its  wealth  of  rational  explanation, 
suggested  irresistibly  some  other  will  at  work,  against 
which  the  will  of  the  imperial  blasphemer  of  Potsdam 
was  impotent.  But  there  the  fact  stood,  and  there  was 
only  one  inference  that  could  be  drawn  from  it — the 
German  dream  of  conquest  could  not  survive  the 
Marne. 

An  immense  load  was  lifted  from  my  mind,  and  the 
words  of  Herridge  and  Alphonse  filled  my  ears — "The 
war  will  end  at  Christmas." 


NEW  YORK  119 

I  found  the  papers  saying  the  same  thing.  The  mih- 
tary  experts  predicted  a  swift  retreat  of  German  armies 
to  German  soil.  They  drew  their  parallels  from  the 
Franco-Prussian  war  of  1870,  in  which  decisive  vic- 
tory in  the  open  field  was  the  dominating  factor.  They 
argued  that  a  great  invading  host  must  maintain  its 
power  of  invasion  unchecked  till  its  object  is  attained; 
once  stopped  and  turned  back  disintegration  was  in- 
evitable. The  grim  device  of  trench  warfare  which 
was  to  draw  a  line  of  underground  defences  from  the 
sea  to  Switzerland,  no  one  had  foreseen,  not  even 
Germany.  Germany  had  lost  her  mobility,  her  power 
of  initiative,  and  according  to  all  military  science  this 
was  fatal.  So  I  read,  believing,  for  I  had  no  knowl- 
edge by  which  to  interrogate  my  belief ;  in  which,  had 
I  known  it,  I  was  no  worse  off  than  the  oracular  ex- 
perts themselves. 

Another  thing  was  clear  too;  I  was  now  able  to 
take  up  my  literary  work,  free  from  the  apprehension 
that  I  might  be  constrained  to  enlist.  How  real  that 
apprehension  was  I  did  not  know  till  it  was  suddenly 
removed.  I  knew  now  that  I  had  not  been  truly 
happy  since  that  day  at  Fruitvale  when  Morrison  told 
me  war  was  declared  between  England  and  Germany. 
I  thought  of  Alan  Joddrel,  and  imagined  him  once 
more  on  his  ranch,  I  thought  of  Alice,  and  knew  that 
she  would  be  in  New  York  before  long,  and  I  thought 
of  the  good  time  I  would  give  her.  My  old  life  was 
miraculously  restored  to  me,  the  tasks  I  loved,  the 
purposes  I  planned,  the  love  which  had  already  whis- 
pered to  me  of  hidden  Paradises.     I  was  as  a  man 


I20  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

released  from  the  fear  of  death,  who  leaves  the  doc- 
tor's office  with  a  sense  that  the  whole  world  is  fresh- 
illumined  for  him — every  star  brighter,  every  flower 
sweeter,  every  familiar  aspect  transfigured  by  a  new 
intensity  of  colour. 

It  was  not  until  this  moment  that  I  realised  how 
much  my  imagination  had  been  affected  by  the  war. 
I  had  written  nothing  for  a  month,  and  when  I  had 
tried  to  do  so  my  tiny  stage  had  been  grossly  usurped 
by  this  larger  drama,  so  full  of  wonder,  of  horror 
and  of  heroism.  The  tremendous  drama  of  Mons  had 
taken  strong  hold  upon  me.  I  had  followed  that  mag- 
nificent retreat  with  absorbed  vision.  I  had  seen  that 
little  British  force,  outnumbered  by  six  to  one,  fighting 
steadily  through  fourteen  awful  days  and  nights,  op- 
posing machine  guns  and  rifles  to  the  monstrous  ar- 
tillery of  Germany,  the  men  falling  exhausted,  only 
to  rise  again  indomitable  at  the  bugle-call,  staggering 
half  asleep  along  strange  roads  smashed  with  shrap- 
nel, again  and  again  seeing  the  solid  wave  of  forty 
thousand  foes  hurled  on  them,  wave  behind  wave  in 
interminable  ranks;  packed  together  in  burning  vil- 
lages like  rats  in  a  trap,  yet  always  escaping  at  the  last 
moment  by  a  miracle;  men  technically  defeated  many 
times,  but  never  conscious  of  defeat,  and  never  ac- 
knowledging it — I  had  seen  all  that  in  my  mind,  and 
what  wonder  that  I  could  not  sit  down  to  contrive 
the  motions  of  my  puppets  on  a  paper  stage?  When 
I  had  doubted  my  ability  to  finish  my  book  in  six 
months,  this  was  the  unconfessed  reason  for  my  ap- 
prehension.    I  had  not  mentioned  it  to  Herridge  be- 


NEW  YORK  121 

cause  he  would  not  have  understood  it.  He  would 
have  called  it  a  stupid  obsession,  for  to  him  the  mind 
was  a  machine  driven  by  the  will,  and  any  movement 
of  sympathy  or  alarm  which  was  allowed  to  disturb 
its  accurate  production  was  beyond  his  comprehension. 

And  now  the  obsession,  if  such  it  could  be  called,  was 
removed.  Mons  was  avenged  by  the  Marne.  The 
broken  hosts  of  Germany  were  in  retreat!  The  war 
would  end  by  Christmas!  And  I  was  free  to  set  up 
my  little  stage  again,  to  arrange  my  puppets,  to  set 
my  orchestra  playing  tunes,  with  flute  and  violin  in- 
stead of  brutal  drum  and  angry  trumpet!  I  could 
have  shouted  for  joy,  because  I  was  once  more  an 
artist,  asking  of  life  no  better  thing  than  to  be  allowed 
to  live  as  if  the  ideal  were  real. 

Noon  found  me  at  Herridge's  office, 

A  man  I  knew  by  sight,  named  Hausling,  was  just 
coming  out.  He  had  a  big  solid  Teuton  head,  fair- 
haired  and  close-cropped,  and  a  big  solid  Teuton  body 
swollen  by  too  much  beer.  He  was  an  advertising 
agent,  who  had  reason  to  make  a  business  of  suavity : 
but  to-day  his  face  was  dark  and  his  eyes  angry.  He 
favoured  me  with  a  most  malignant  scowl.  He  passed 
me  by,  and  then  came  back  and  stood  before  me  in  an 
attitude  of  menace. 

I  took  no  notice,  and  was  about  to  enter  Herridge's 
office,  when  he  seized  my  arm  roughly,  and  stammered 
something  about  a  damned  Britisher. 

"What's  the  matter  with  you?"  I  cried. 

"It  will  be  what's  the  matter  with  you  before  long," 
he  retorted.     "You  are  laughing  at  me  and  I  will  not 


122  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

be  laughed  at.  You  shall  pay  for  that  laugh,  my 
friend,  and  your  damned  nation  shall  pay  too." 

"Don't  be  a  fool.     Let  me  pass." 

"And  you  call  me  fool,  do  you  ?  You  shall  pay  for 
that  too!" 

The  man  was  shaken  by  rage.  His  big  hands  trem- 
bled and  his  eyes  were  on  fire  with  passion.  Llis  in- 
solence was  so  gross  that  I  began  to  be  angry  too. 

"Look  here,"  I  cried.  "You  had  better  let  go  of 
my  arm  and  clear  out.  This  is  not  Belgium,  it's  New 
York.     Stand  back  or  I'll  make  you." 

"We  Germans  do  what  we  please,"  he  snarled. 

"Yes,  you  did  it  in  Belgium,  didn't  you?  And  a  pretty 
thing  you  did.  And  now,  thank  God,  you're  getting 
your  own  back  on  the  Marne." 

He  lifted  his  fist,  and  closed  in  on  me  like  an  in- 
furiated bull.  But  I  had  not  learned  boxing  for  noth- 
ing at  Oxford,  and  was  well  aware  that  big  beery  men 
make  a  pretty  poor  show  with  their  fists.  I  got  my 
blow  in  right  beneath  his  chin,  shouting,  "Take  that, 
you  raper  of  women,  you  bully  who  cuts  off  children's 
hands  and  fights  behind  Belgian  petticoats." 

He  went  down  like  a  sack  of  flour. 

From  the  neighbouring  desks  a  score  of  clerks  looked 
up,  and  I  heard  a  sound  not  at  all  neutral  which  re- 
sembled clapping.  Herridge  came  running  out  at  the 
row,  asking  what  was  the  matter. 

"Ask  that  filthy  carcase  on  the  floor,"  I  answered. 

"O,  Hausling  has  been  insulting  you,  has  he?  He 
tried  it  on  with  me  too.     I'm  glad  you  punished  him." 

Hausling  slowly  gathered  himself  up,  brushed  the 


NEW  YORK  123 

dust  from  his  clothes,  and  searched  for  the  ruin  of 
his  broken  eye-glasses.  The  fight  had  quite  gone  out 
of  him.  His  face  was  mottled  and  blood  was  flowing 
from  his  chin.  When  he  saw  Herridge,  I  suppose 
business  interests  got  the  better  of  Teutonic  rage,  for 
he  said  heavily,  "I  abologise." 

"Get  out,"  said  Herridge,  "and  don't  come  back. 
And  you  can  tell  your  firm  that  unless  they  can  send 
some  one  decent,  I've  done  with  them." 

"That's  a  dangerous  kind  of  beast,"  he  continued, 
as  we  went  into  the  office.  "I  suppose  it's  charitable 
to  assume  he's  mad.  There  are  a  good  many  mad 
Germans  in  New  York  to-day." 

"Over  this  morning's  news,  eh  ?" 

"Precisely.     They  know  they're  beaten." 

"Did  Hausling  acknowledge  that?" 

"Not  he.  He  treated  me  to  his  views  about  Ger- 
man expansion,  and  assured  me  nothing  in  earth  or 
heaven  could  hinder  it.  He  also  remarked  that  God 
was  on  their  side." 

"God  isn't  to  be  congratulated  on  the  company  he 
keeps  then." 

"O,  for  that  matter  every  nation  says  much  the  same 
thing  when  it  goes  to  war.  Man  makes  God  in  his 
own  image,  you  know.  I  think  I  told  Hausling  that 
as  a  representative  of  God  he  cut  a  rather  poor  fig- 


ure." 


"And  then  he  slanged  you?" 

"No,  it  wasn't  that  altogether.  He  saw  the  morn- 
ing papers  on  my  desk  with  the  account  of  the  victory 
on  the  Marne,  and  I  guess  the  headlines  infuriated 


124  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

him.  He  cursed  your  country  up  hill  and  down  dale 
because  she  had  come  into  the  war  when  she  wasn't 
expected.  I  suppose  when  he  saw  you  that  was  the 
last  straw  which  upset  his  balance.  Upon  the  whole 
I'm  rather  glad  you  knocked  him  down,  for  I  was 
strongly  tempted  to  do  it  myself." 

"That  wasn't  being  altogether  neutral  in  word  and 
thought,  was  it?"  I  laughed. 

"O,  I'm  strictly  neutral  about  the  war  itself,  I  as- 
sure you.  But  this  was  a  personal  affair.  I  don't  like 
Germans.  The  best  are  drunk  with  egoism  and  the 
others  are  vulgar  bullies.  Hausling  belongs  to  the 
latter  class." 

"1  wonder  whether  anybody  likes  them.  I  know  I 
don't." 

'T  rather  think  that's  the  root  of  the  trouble  with 
them.  They've  done  all  sorts  of  wonderful  things  in 
the  way  of  organisation  and  efficiency.  They've  built 
up  a  great  empire  out  of  the  poorest  sort  of  materials. 
At  the  end  of  it  all  they  find  no  one  loves  them,  and 
they  have  to  be  content  with  be-lauding  each  other  as 
the  greatest  people  on  the  earth.  They're  suffering 
from  hurt  vanity.  They  want  the  world  to  acknowl- 
edge their  virtues  and  instead  the  world  treats  them 
as  beastly  nuisances." 

"Nations  surely  don't  go  to  war  because  of  hurt 
vanity?" 

"Don't  they.  Read  your  history,  and  you'll  find  that 
half  the  wars  of  the  world  have  been  occasioned  by 
just  this  and  nothing  else.  Emperors  are  jealous,  dip- 
lomats are  touchy,  slights  are  magnified  into  insults, 


NEW  YORK  125 

inadvertencies  in  etiquette  are  interpreted  as  national 
affronts — and  then  one  day  a  little  wind  of  rage  fans 
these  smouldering  rubbish  heaps  of  envy  and  unchar- 
itableness,  and  the  fire  of  war  blazes  up.  I  thank 
God,  as  I  told  you  the  other  day,  that  we  Americans 
are  outside  this  devilish  maelstrom  of  European  jeal- 
ousies. And  now  I  thank  God  for  another  thing,  the 
whole  diabolic  business  is  in  collapse,  and  the  end  of 
the  war's  in  sight." 

"You  really  think  the  Marne  settled  it,  do  you?" 

"Undoubtedly.  Germany's  shot  her  bolt  and  missed 
the  target.  You  saw  how  that  fellow  Hausling  apolo- 
gised the  moment  he  was  knocked  down.  That's  what 
Germany  will  do.  Like  Hausling,  she'll  awake  to  a 
sense  of  her  business  interests,  and  smother  her  re- 
sentment." 

He  rose  abruptly,  went  to  his  safe,  and  took  from  it 
some  papers. 

"Upon  my  soul,"  he  said.  "I'd  almost  forgotten 
the  agreement.  That's  another  grudge  I  have  against 
Hausling,  he's  robbed  me  of  half  an  hour  of  valuable 
time  and  made  me  late  for  lunch.  Well,  I've  read  your 
story,  and  I  needn't  say  I  like  it.  Here's  the  agree- 
ment in  duplicate.  Just  read  it  through.  I  presume 
you  are  ready  to  sign  it." 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "I'm  quite  ready.  I  hesitated  yes- 
terday because  I  was  afraid  to  tie  myself  to  a  six 
months'  job,  but  to-day's  news  has  removed  that  fear." 

"It's  removed  a  little  fear  from  my  mind  too,  for 
you're  such  an  erratic  fellow  I  wasn't  at  all  sure  you 


126  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

wouldn't  throw  me  over  if  the  war-fever  got  hold  of 
you." 

*'rm  still  a  little  afraid  of  writing  under  compul- 
sion. Do  you  know  I  haven't  written  a  line  for  a 
month,  simply  because  my  mind  has  been  stultified  by 
the  war?" 

"Well,  you'll  write  all  the  better  on  the  rebound. 
The  war  won't  distress  you  any  more,  for  it's  as  good 
as  finished.  You'll  find  the  relief  to  your  mind  will 
release  your  imagination,  and  you'll  write  better  and 
faster  than  you  ever  did." 

"Yes,  I  think  that  too.  Ever  since  I  read  this  morn- 
ing's news  I've  had  a  strong  impulse  to  start  writing. 
My  only  trouble  is  to  find  a  quiet  place  to  write  in. 
New  York  isn't  Fruitvale,  you  know." 

"Well,  I  guess  we  can  meet  that  want  without  dif- 
ficulty. I'll  give  you  a  room  in  the  building  if  you 
like — it's  as  quiet  as  a  bird's  nest  in  a  tree.  Or  you 
can  come  down  to  my  place  on  Long  Island.  I'm 
away  all  day,  and  you're  welcome  to  use  my  house  as 
you  like." 

"That's  awfully  good  of  you,  Herridge." 

"Not  at  all.  Just  plain  self-interest  again.  I  want 
the  very  best  work  you  can  do,  for  you're  a  new  man 
to  my  readers,  and  my  reputation  is  at  stake  as  well 
as  yours.  I'd  really  like  you  to  think  of  me  as  a  kind 
of  partner  in  this  job." 

"It's  a  great  thing  to  have  an  editor  who  believes 
in  you,  and  I  appreciate  it.  I  believe  half  the  books 
fail  because  publishers  don't  believe  in  their  authors." 

"You'll  not  have  cause  to  blame  me  on  that  score. 


NEW  YORK  127 

I'm  not  an  emotional  person,  and  the  other  day  I  heard 
a  man  describing  me  as  'A  dry  stick.'  Perhaps  I  am. 
But  I  will  be  indiscreet  enough  to  confess  a  real  liking 
for  both  you  and  your  work — only  don't  hold  that 
against  me  when  I  criticise  your  story  with  a  brutal 
frankness,  as  I  very  likely  shall  before  you're  through 
with  it." 

So  the  agreement  was  signed.  I  was  to  deliver  the 
first  instalment  of  the  story  immediately,  and  the  com- 
plete manuscript  in  six  months.  The  terms  were  far 
more  generous  than  I  had  any  right  to  expect.  Her- 
ridge  might  go  on  asserting  that  his  master  principle 
was  self-interest,  but  certainly  he  had  served  my  in- 
terests in  a  way  that  indicated  real  friendship.  I  was 
assured  of  an  income  far  beyond  any  I  had  yet  en- 
joyed, and  as  I  left  the  office  a  new  thought  whispered 
in  my  mind — I  might  now  marry  Alice  Croxon,  if 
she  would  have  me. 

What  happier  hour  can  come  to  any  young  man  than 
that  which  unites  recognition  of  his  work  with  the 
hope  of  love?  The  room  "quiet  as  a  bird's  nest  in 
a  tree,"  in  that  great  office  building,  or  the  borrowed 
house  at  Long  Island,  were  well  enough,  but  I  saw  a 
better  vision  of  a  house  that  was  my  own,  humble  it 
might  be  as  the  shack  at  Fruitvale — but  my  own,  with 
one  dear  face  that  brought  sunlight  into  every  room. 
And  I  saw  a  desk  before  a  window,  commanding  great 
breadths  of  green  forest  and  shining  water,  and  an 
indefatigable  hand  piling  up  the  sheets  of  manuscript 
in  which  my  thoughts  had  taken  shape,  and  perhaps — 
who  knew  ? — a  gentle  critic  standing  by  my  chair,  with 


128  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

tlie  perfume  of  youth  and  summer  in  her  hair  and 
dress. 

It  was  a  marvellous  day,  this  eleventh  of  September. 
It  was  my  red-letter  day,  and  what  matter  if  it  was 
Friday?  I  had  always  found  my  luck  in  odd  numbers 
and  suspected  days.  This  was  my  luckiest  day  of 
all,  and  New  York  seemed  to  know  it,  for  never  were 
the  streets  more  bright  with  sunshine,  and  not  for  many 
weeks  had  the  faces  one  met  been  so  cheerfully  elate. 


IV 

I  soon  found  reason  to  congratulate  myself  that 
I  had  not  availed  myself  of  the  room  in  the  office  build- 
ing or  the  house  on  Long  Island  which  Herridge  had 
obligingly  offered  me.  In  either  case  I  should  have 
put  myself  not  only  under  obligation  to  Herridge  but 
under  his  tutelage.  He  had  promised  to  criticise  my 
work  with  brutal  frankness,  and  it  was  not  long  before 
he  showed  his  hand. 

He  began  with  a  long  didactic  letter,  very  carefully 
and  even  brilliantly  composed,  in  which  he  declared 
what  might  have  been  called  the  creed  of  an  editor. 
He  used  with  great  effect  his  former  image  of  a  menu, 
which  must  be  carefully  composed  to  titillate  the  taste 
and  capture  the  appetite  of  the  general  reader.  The 
general  reader,  as  he  imagined  him,  was  a  person  of 
profound  ignorance  thinly  veneered  with  conventional 
prejudice,  which  he  mistook  for  culture.  He  had  no 
idea  of  being  instructed,  and  read  a  magazine  for  no 


NEW  YORK  129 

such  purpose,  being  perfectly  assured  that  he  already 
knew  everything  that  was  worth  knowing.  His  gen- 
eral idea  of  moral  drama  did  not  rise  above  the  tragedy 
of  Punch  and  Judy.  Any  drama  that  was  more  com- 
plicated in  motive  and  action  only  puzzled  him,  and 
often  enraged  him  to  the  point  of  refusing  to  read 
the  Magazine,  which  was  a  calamity  the  faithful  ed- 
itor must  avoid  at  all  costs. 

I  laughed  a  good  deal  over  this  letter,  but 
soon  I  found  that  it  was  no  laughing  matter. 
No  sooner  had  Herridge  read  my  incomplete  story 
than  he  summoned  me  to  repeated  interviews  in  which 
his  tactics  of  continuous  pressure  were  brought  into 
play.  He  was  always  friendly,  often  humorous,  at 
the  worst  anxiously  civil;  he  stated  his  points  with 
precision  and  patience ;  but  he  was  quite  imperturbable 
in  his  belief  that  his  judgment  was  right,  and  any 
contradiction  of  his  views  a  childish  ignorance.  It 
seemed  he  took  particular  exception  to  everything  that 
he  called  "fine  writing."  Poetic  metaphors  annoyed 
him.  Descriptions  of  sunrises  and  sunsets  enraged 
him.  They  delayed  the  narrative.  What  he  wanted, 
or,  as  he  was  careful  to  put  it,  what  the  general  reader 
wanted,  was  quick  action.  Something  must  happen 
in  every  chapter.  Each  instalment  must  end  on  a 
climax.  The  story  must  keep  the  reader  guessing.  It 
was  of  no  consequence  that  such  a  story  was  not  in 
the  least  like  life,  in  which  drama  develops  slowly 
from  a  multitude  of  obscure  causes ;  this  was  the  mag- 
azine reader's  idea  of  life,  and  since  he  paid  the  price 
he  had  a  right  to  call  the  tune. 


130  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"You  remind  me  of  nothing  so  much,"  I  cried  at 
last  in  exasperation,  "as  the  classic  exclamation  of 
old  Astley  who  ran  a  circus  in  London.  One  day  he 
attended  a  rehearsal  of  his  hosts,  who  were  engaged 
in  dialogue.  He  listened  with  impatience,  and  at  last 
shouted  angrily,  "For  God's  sake,  cut  the  cackle  and 
bring  out  the  'osses." 

"And  a  very  wise  criticism  too,"  he  retorted. 

"For  a  circus,"  I  protested,  "but  not  for  a  novel." 

"For  any  kind  of  drama,  whether  acted  or  written," 
he  replied. 

"Read  the  great  novels — there's  your  refutation," 
I  retorted. 

"I've  read  them,  and  will  you  venture  to  tell  me  that 
Scott  isn't  slow,  and  Thackeray  tedious,  and  Dickens 
dull?  You  couldn't  run  either  of  them  in  a  modern 
magazine,  and  you  know  it." 

"I  suppose  you  think  you  could  edit  them  with  ad- 
vantage?" 

"I  certainly  could — with  a  blue  pencil.  I'd  cut  them 
down  by  half,  and  they'd  be  all  the  better  for  it.  This 
adulation  of  the  older  writers  is  only  a  tradition. 
They'd  the  luck  to  write  when  they'd  the  field  to  them- 
selves, and  that's  why  they've  become  classics.  I  don't 
say  they  weren't  great  writers — they  were ;  but  they're 
no  models  for  to-day.  They  lived  in  the  tallow-candle 
and  the  stage-coach  days;  we  live  in  the  electric  era. 
You  don't  tell  me  the  world  revolves  on  its  axis  every 
twenty-four  hours  just  the  same  as  it  did  in  the  days 
of  Scott.     Not  a  bit  of  it.     You  bet  it's  doing  it  in 


NEW  YORK  131 

eix,  and  the  old  stars  are  racing  like  mad  to  keep  the 
pace." 

Of  course  I  laughed,  but  nevertheless  I  was  irritated. 
He  couldn't  reject  my  story — I  knew  that;  but  this 
perpetual  nagging  at  my  style  and  method  robbed  me 
of  my  confidence.  I  found  myself  stopping,  as  I 
wrote,  over  every  metaphor,  and  saying,  "Herridge 
won't  like  that."  He  became  a  sort  of  sneering 
Mephistopheles,  looking  over  my  shoulder,  whispering 
detraction  and  ruining  my  invention.  I  think  he  came 
to  see  that  the  thing  he  wanted  me  to  do  was  not  likely 
to  be  attained  by  the  means  he  used.  One  day  he  said 
wearily,  "We  don't  seem  to  hit  it  very  well,  do  we?" 
And  yet  I  know  your  work  is  good  somehow.  I'll 
make  a  bargain  with  you.  Go  away  for  two  months, 
and  write  just  as  you  like.  Choose  some  quiet  place, 
and  don't  come  to  see  me.  Maybe,  when  we  do 
meet  we'll  get  closer  together  in  our  views.  I'll  only 
ask  you  to  remember  one  thing :  I've  as  big  an  interest 
in  your  success  as  you  have,  and  do  try  to  let  my  ex- 
perience guide  you,  as  far  as  you  can  make  it  possi- 
ble." 

This  was  a  generous  concession,  and  it  was  also  wise 
counsel.  I  have  always  needed  quietude  to  write  my 
best.  And  I  don't  mean  by  that  the  kind  of  quiet  you 
get  in  the  heart  of  a  great  city  if  you  search  for  it, 
but  the  real  isolation  and  detachment  from  the  throng 
that  you  find  in  loneliness.  That  is  why  I  loved  Fruit- 
vale  so  much,  why  I  wrote  with  such  delightful  ease 
there.  I  had  nothing  to  look  at  but  the  calm  proces- 
sion of  the  hours,  from  the  earliest  robed  in  gold  to 


132  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

the  latest  clothed  in  purple.  I  heard  no  sound  but  the 
soft  sandals  of  Time  moving  through  green  woods,  and 
the  silence  was  sometimes  so  intense  that  one  almost 
heard  the  heavens  moving  overhead.  And  when  the 
moon  rose  it  was  less  the  moon  that  rose  than  the 
earth  that  swung  upward  like  a  silent  ship,  beautifully 
buoyant,  irresistibly  propelled  upon  the  seas  of  air. 

There  was  no  Fruitvale  near  New  York,  but  chance, 
which  has  so  often  favoured  me,  gave  me  something 
that  resembled  it  in  its  remoteness  from  the  central 
tides  of  life. 

I  had  noticed  more  than  once  in  Herridge's  office 
a  tall  fair-haired  girl  who  read  proofs  for  him  and  did 
occasional  secretarial  work.  She  was  dressed  with  a 
little  less  than  t}^pical  American  neatness,  but  always 
with  good  taste,  and  she  had  a  freshness  of  complexion 
rare  in  American  women.  One  day,  when  I  was  wait- 
ing for  Herridge,  I  found  her  reading  the  proofs  of  my 
story,  and  she  looked  up  with  a  charming  flush  of  em- 
barrassment. 

"May  I  say  that  I  like  your  story  very  much?"  she 
said. 

"I  am  delighted  that  you  should.  It  doesn't  alto- 
gether please  Mr.  Herridge,  you  know." 

She  smiled,  and  I  was  struck  by  the  beauty 'of  her 
eyes.  They  were  of  a  peculiar  shade  of  hazel,  very 
clear  and  candid,  rather  wide  apart,  under  finely  arched 
brows.  Her  face  was  not  beautiful,  but  it  was  hon- 
est and  good,  and  her  smile  was  winning. 

"I'm  English,  you  know,  and  perhaps  that's  why  I 


NEW  YORK  133 

appreciate  some  things  in  your  story  that  Mr.  Her- 
ridge  can't." 

"You're  English,"  I  exclaimed.  "Why  didn't  you 
tell  me  before?" 

"I've  never  had  the  opportunity,"  she  said  demurely. 

Herridge  was  a  long  time  coming,  and  it  was  na- 
tural that  we  should  fall  into  conversation.  By  de- 
grees I  drew  from  her  her  simple  story.  Her  name 
was  Grace  Lorimer,  and  her  father  had  come  to  the 
States  to  take  a  position  in  a  chemical  manufactory 
two  years  earlier.  He  was  a  delicate  man,  and  his 
first  American  winter  had  killed  him.  There  was  an- 
other sister,  Mary,  who  lived  at  home  with  her  mother, 
and  there  was  one  brother  who  remained  in  England 
and  had  enlisted  when  the  war  broke  out.  The  mother 
and  the  two  sisters  lived  in  a  little  town  called  Oak- 
wood,  at  the  base  of  the  New  Jersey  hills.  The  house 
had  been  bought  by  Mr.  Lorimer,  who  found  its  soli- 
tude attractive,  for  it  was  surrounded  by  fine  woods, 
which  recalled  Surrey,  the  part  of  England  which  he 
knew  best  and  loved  most.  When  he  died  the  widow 
did  not  care  to  sell  or  let  the  house,  although  it  was 
much  too  expensive  for  her  means.  It  was  to  her 
grieved  heart  the  only  bit  of  England  left  to  her, 
because  her  husband  had  lived  in  it. 

By  various  stages  I  came  to  know  Grace  Lorimer 
more  intimately.  I  found  her  intelligent,  though  not 
cultured :  S3mipathetic  in  a  modest  womanly  way  with 
my  literary  ideals,  without  any  pretension  to  compre- 
hend them  in  any  blue-stocking  fashion. 


134  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

One  day,  as  I  was  leaving  the  office  she  said  to  me 
shyly,  "May  I  say  something  to  you?" 

"Why  certainly.  Is  it  some  error  in  my  proofs  you 
have  discovered?" 

"No,  it's  quite  another  matter.  I  told  you  all  about 
the  place  where  we  live,  and  I  wondered  whether  you'd 
like  to  come  there  to  do  your  writing.  We're  not  well 
off,  as  you  know,  and  mother  has  often  said  she  would 
like  to  have  a  lodger.  The  house  is  much  too  big  for 
us,  and  there's  lots  of  room  in  it.  I've  wanted  to  say 
this  for  some  time,  but  I've  been  ashamed  to  do  so.  I 
thought  you  might  think  it  presumptuous,  and  be- 
sides  " 

She  flushed,  and  I  understood  her  unuttered 
thought.  She  feared  I  might  misjudge  her  motive,  but 
I  had  only  to  gaze  into  those  perfectly  frank  eyes  of 
hers  to  know  that  she  was  thinking  a  good  deal  more 
about  her  mother  than  about  me. 

"You  needn't  be  ashamed,"  I  said.  "And  you 
needn't  talk  of  presumption.  I  am  grateful  that  you 
should  have  thought  so  kindly  of  me." 

"Well,  you  see,"  she  said  with  a  smile,  "I'm  still 
English  enough  to  be  a  little  ashamed  of  having  to  let 
lodgings,  and  I'm  not  snob  enough  to  call  the  thing 
taking  "a  paying  guest."  America  has  taught  me  one 
thing  pretty  thoroughly — to  be  practical;  and  this  is  a 
practical  matter.  I  want  you  to  see  it  in  that  light  and 
in  no  other." 

"Let  us  be  severely  practical  then.  And  suppose, 
to  begin  with,  you  come  to  lunch  with  me,  and  give 
me  accurate  details  about  Oakwood." 


NEW  YORK  135 

"I  don't  know  whether  I  ought  to  do  that,"  she 
said  timidly.. 

"An  American  girl  wouldn't  hesitate,  and  you're 
learning  American  practicality,"  I  laughed. 

"Very  well,"  she  said.  "Only  please  don't  take  me 
to  any  fashionable  place.  My  clothes  are  not  quite 
what  I  would  wish." 

We  went  to  a  quiet  little  Italian  restaurant  near 
Twenty-third  Street,  whose  very  humble  Bohemianism 
rather  shocked  her.  I  gathered  that  she  was  accus- 
tomed to  those  white-tiled  refectories  where  people 
eat  off  marble  tables,  and  that  her  luncheon  was  the 
usual  woman's  meal  of  bakery  products  and  a  glass  of 
milk.  She  certainly  needed  not  to  fear  comparison 
with  the  women  who  lunched  at  Gonzali's.  She  shone 
among  them  like  a  fair  flower  among  weeds.  Her 
good  fresh-coloured  face  had  a  wholesomeness  in  strik- 
ing contrast  with  the  yellow  pallor  of  the  Italian 
women,  and  the  powdered  faces  of  the  New  York 
women. 

Of  course  we  fell  to  talking  about  England,  and 
this  put  her  at  her  ease.  She  had  lived  the  usual  life 
of  the  middle-class  English  girl  of  the  better  class — 
Mudie's  Library,  lawn-tennis,  a  holiday  in  Switzer- 
land, a  day  at  Henley  Regatta,  an  occasional  visit  to 
London  and  its  theatres — a  domestic  life  of  plain 
duties  and  placid  pleasures;  and  then  the  sudden  exo- 
dus to  America,  dictated  partly  by  her  father's  health, 
partly  by  the  offer  of  a  much  more  lucrative  position 
than  he  enjoyed  in  England.  The  discovery  of  Oak- 
wood  was  quite  fortuitous.     The  family  had  to  live 


136  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

somewhere,  and,  in  their  total  ignorance  of  America, 
one  locality  was  as  good  as  another.  The  accident  of 
a  motor-ride,  of  an  old  red-brick  house  behind  tall 
maples,  of  an  obliging  agent  who  was  an  expert  in 
business  eloquence,  and  the  house  was  theirs. 

"It's  really  very  pleasant,"  she  said.  "And  father 
was  quite  right  in  seeing  something  English  in  it 
After  seeing  nothing  but  tall  apartment  houses  in  New 
York,  and  wooden  houses  in  the  country,  the  red 
bricks  were  a  souvenir  of  home.  He  bought  it  for 
the  sake  of  the  red  bricks.  But  you  must  come  and 
see  it  for  yourself." 

"Isn't  it  rather  a  long  way  out?"  I  asked. 

"About  an  hour.  I  should  have  thought  that  a 
tremendous  distance  in  England,  but  somehow  I  never 
think  of  it  here.  For  that  matter,  I'd  rather  go  twice 
the  distance  than  live  in  New  York." 

And  then  she  added  with  a  touch  of  passion  that 
brought  the  flash  of  tears  into  her  eyes,  "I  hate  New 
York.  I  couldn't  live  without  the  sight  of  trees  and 
flowers.  However  tired  I  am  when  I  get  home,  I'm 
refreshed  the  moment  that  I  see  the  trees.  It's  like  a 
bath  for  the  mind.  And  the  flowers  are  like  wine — 
they  make  you  forget." 

In  the  words  so  simply  spoken,  I  read  all  the  tragedy 
of  exile.  I,  too,  had  felt  it,  especially  in  my  first 
months  in  New  York,  when  I  was  training  myself  to 
forget,  trying  to  persuade  myself  that  New  York  was 
another  London,  and  knowing  all  the  time  that  it  was 
a  city  more  foreign  to  me  than  Paris,  and  with  as  little 
appeal  to  the  affections  as  Pekin.    All  at  once  I  found 


NEW   YORK  137 

myself  sharing  Lorimer's  point  of  view;  a  red-brick 
house  with  lawns  and  woods  was  a  paradisal  vision, 
because  it  seemed  a  bit  of  England.  Hither  my  des- 
tiny led;  it  pointed  to  it  with  a  gesture  alluring  and 
imperative. 

We  parted  at  the  office  with  a  promise  that  I  would 
come  to  Oakwood  the  next  evening. 

"Come  to  dinner,"  she  said.  "And  since  you  don't 
know  how  to  get  there  I  must  be  immodest  enough  to 
ask  you  to  go  out  with  me." 

The  next  night  we  descended  into  a  noisome  hole  in 
the  earth,  got  into  a  waiting  train  at  Hoboken,  flashed 
across  the  olive-grey  Jersey  meadows,  and  came  at 
last  to  a  little  country  station.  Great  hanging  woods 
rose  to  the  westward,  a  cliff  of  woods  rose  to  the  north, 
a  dusty  road  ran  at  its  base.  We  took  the  road,  under 
a  sky  of  emerald  green  washed  with  pale  gold,  and 
came  at  the  end  of  half  a  mile  to  the  red-brick  house 
among  the  yellowing  maples. 


CHAPTER  III 
THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD 


A  NEW  life  began  for  me  when  I  went  to  live  at 
Oakwood.  I  had  been  suddenly  withdrawn  from  a 
place  of  great  tumult  and  had  found  peace,  much  as 
one  lifts  the  heavy  leather  curtain  at  the  porch  of 
a  Cathedral,  and  passes  from  the  clamour  of  the  mar- 
ket-place into  the  sacred  silences  of  immemorial  tran- 
quillity. 

It  was  on  Thanksgiving  Day  that  I  took  up  my  resi- 
dence with  the  Lorimers.  The  Indian  summer  still 
lingered.  A  thin  powder  of  snow  lay  on  the  edges  of 
the  woods,  but  the  woods  still  retained  some  of  the 
pageantry  of  autumn,  like  a  ragged  ribbon  of  dimmed 
gold  and  purple  drawn  round  the  limbs  of  a  cripple. 
New  York  seemed  very  far  away.  From  the  top  of 
the  wooded  hills  I  could  see  its  white  towers  rise 
ghostly  through  a  faint  haze,  and  at  night  its  lights 
glittered  against  the  sky;  but  for  me  the  vision  was 
like  a  lighted  city  which  seamen  behold  along  a  shore 
distant  from  them,  inaccessible  and  undesired. 

At  first  my  relations  with  the  Lorimers  were  a  little 
difficult.     I  had  the  sense  of  intrusion.     Everything 

138 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  139 

that  a  cold  friendliness  could  accomplish  to  set  me 
at  my  ease  was  done,  but  it  was  clear  that  Mrs.  Lori- 
mer  found  it  hard  to  reconcile  herself  to  my  presence 
in  the  house.  She  was  naturally  reticent,  with  a  great 
deal  of  wholesome  pride  about  her,  not  at  all  the  pride 
that  apes  gentility,  but  the  pride  of  independence. 
English  people  have  usually  very  strict  ideas  about  the 
privacy  of  the  home.  I  think  it  hurt  Mrs.  Lorimer 
that  a  stranger's  eyes  should  look  upon  the  intimately 
personal  things  of  her  home — for  instance  the  portrait 
of  her  husband  that  hung  over  the  mantel  in  the  dining- 
room  and  the  photograph  of  her  son  Qiarles  in  his 
uniform,  and  some  little  water-colour  sketches  of  her 
two  girls  as  children  in  short  frocks  in  a  seaside  gar- 
den. I  was  undiscerning  enough  to  ask  some  thought- 
less questions  about  these  sketches  the  first  night  I  was 
there,  and  I  noticed  that  the  next  day  they  were  re- 
moved. 

Of  Mary  Lorimer — the  other  sister — I  shall  have 
more  to  say  later;  I  will  content  myself  at  present 
with  a  rapid  portrait.  Like  her  sister  Grace  she  was 
tall,  with  a  singularly  perfect  figure,  but  in  all  other 
respects  she  was  entirely  different.  Her  hair  was 
dark  and  abundant,  piled  in  a  great  mass  across  a  low 
forehead.  Her  eye-brows  matched  her  hair,  black 
straight  lines  drawn  heavily,  as  by  a  careless  artist. 
Her  face  carried  out  this  impression  of  careless  artistry 
as  though  Nature  had  begun  to  fashion  a  fine  design, 
but  had  grown  tired,  and  had  ended  in  blunt  uneven 
lines.  Her  sole  facial  beauty  was  her  eyes ;  these  were 
very  dark,  with  an  indescribable  effect  of  smouldering 


I40  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

fire.  She  had  a  disconcerting  habit  of  fixing  these  eyes 
on  you,  with  a  kind  of  sullen  questioning,  and  with- 
drawing her  gaze  suddenly  as  if  in  scorn  of  what  she 
found. 

At  first  I  supposed  that  her  sullenness  was  simply 
resentment  at  my  intrusion ;  later  on  I  came  to  see  that 
it  was  of  a  much  broader  quality.  It  was  resentment 
against  many  things  in  life,  resentment,  in  a  sense, 
of  Hfe  itself.  It  was  pride,  scorn,  sorrow,  unequally 
combined,  and  at  the  back  of  it  all  a  plain  woman's 
bitterness  in  the  knowledge  of  her  plainness.  She  had 
some  of  the  qualities  of  mind  and  character  that  make 
men  notable;  she  had  some  of  the  separate  qualities 
that  make  women  beautiful;  but  these  qualities  were 
not  in  combination  but  collision,  and  she  was  aware 
of  her  misfortune. 

However,  I  was  only  too  glad  to  find  a  refuge  in 
which  I  could  do  my  work,  and  was  not  disposed  to 
be  critical.  I  had  a  delightful  room,  facing  the  wooded 
heights,  in  which  I  worked.  I  was  no  longer  pes- 
tered with  the  mischievous  pedantries  of  Herridge. 
My  mind  plunged  deep  in  my  theme,  and  my  imagina- 
tion began  to  move  again  with  freedom.  Grace  Lori- 
mer  came  home  from  the  city  every  night,  bringing 
with  her  cheerfulness  and  a  gift  of  creating  pleasure. 
As  the  nights  grew  colder  we  sat  round  a  log-fire  after 
dinner,  and  began  to  find  a  real  intercourse. 

I  had  escaped  from  Herridge.  I  had  found  a  place 
in  which  I  could  write;  but  I  soon  discovered  that  I 
had  not  escaped  from  the  vision  of  War.  The  photo- 
graph of  young  Charles  Lorimer  in  his  uniform  was 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  141 

a  perpetual  reminder  of  its  tragedy.  The  eyes  of  Mrs. 
Lorimer  were  often  fixed  upon  it;  indeed  they  never 
left  it.  Letters  and  papers  for  the  Lorimers  from 
England  arrived  regularly,  and  the  latter  I  read  with 
eager  interest. 

The  battle  of  the  Aisne  had  followed  the  Mame,  and 
I  had  begun  to  see  that  the  war  was  very  far  from 
over.  I  read  of  recruiting,  and  always  more  recruit- 
ing; of  Oxford  and  Cambridge  denuded  of  both  grad- 
uates and  professors;  of  troops  leaving  and  the  long 
trains  of  wounded  men  returning;  of  the  whole  na- 
tion slowly  collecting  its  strength  for  a  struggle  such 
as  it  had  never  entered  into  the  mind  of  man  to  im- 
agine. Yet  my  early  theories  about  the  war,  while 
shaken,  were  by  no  means  destroyed.  I  could  not  be- 
lieve that  the  resources  of  the  nations  were  equal  to 
a  prolonged  struggle.  I  could  not  believe  that  the 
statements  which  were  beginning  to  appear  concern- 
ing Gennany's  deliberate  plan  of  world  domination 
had  any  real  foundation  in  fact.  A  few  mad  militar- 
ists might  cherish  such  a  dream,  but  it  could  not  rep- 
resent the  sober  purpose  of  a  whole  nation.  Of  course 
I  read  Trietschke,  and  Bernhardhi,  and  Nietzche,  and 
what  Professor  Cramb  had  to  say  about  them,  but 
I  was  still  unconvinced.  According  to  them  the  Na- 
poleonic meglomania  was  alive  and  rampant  again. 
But  had  not  the  world  once  and  for  all  stamped  out 
that  kind  of  madness  at  St.  Helena?  And,  besides, 
whatever  powers  the  German  Kaiser  might  possess, 
he  was  most  certainly  no  Napoleon. 

I  state  these  errors  of  mine  without  apology  because 


142  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

they  were  typical.  They  belonged  to  the  common 
mind  of  191 4.  They  certainly  flourished  both  in  Eng- 
land and  America — particularly  America.  English 
opinion  of  the  war,  as  I  saw  reflected  in  the  news- 
papers of  1914,  betrayed  Httle  vision  of  the  real  causes 
which  produced  it.  German  unscrupulousness,  Ger- 
man fright  fulness,  German  efficiency  were  recognised; 
but  not  the  quality  of  German  ambition.  It  was  still 
less  recognised  in  the  States.  In  every  large  American 
city  there  were  Germans,  sober,  industrious,  rather 
slow-going  men  for  the  most  part;  how  was  it  possi- 
ble to  associate  them  with  wild  dreams  of  world-em- 
pire? Men  less  qualified  for  world-empire  could  not 
be  imagined.  That  men  of  this  order  should  be  con- 
spirators working  toward  world  dominion  appeared  in- 
credible. If,  in  1914,  any  one  had  ventured  to  declare 
that  the  American  Republic  was  actually  threatened 
by  the  growth  of  German  power,  he  would  have  been 
derided  as  an  insane  "calamity-howler." 

Yet  there  stood  Charles  Lorimer's  portrait  on  the 
mantel,  with  a  tiny  Union  Jack  draped  over  it,  and 
I  could  not  look  at  it  without  some  misgiving.  It 
was  a  good  honest  face,  like  that  of  his  sister  Grace; 
the  face  of  a  quiet  youth,  who  doubtless  had  been 
trained  in  the  conventional  virtues  of  his  class.  I 
gathered  that  he  had  been  educated  as  an  architect,  and 
had  enlisted  in  the  Artist's  corps  when  the  war  broke 
out,  much  to  the  grief  and  consternation  of  his  mother. 
What  was  there  in  the  nature  of  the  war  that  had 
touched  this  sober-minded  boy?  I  could  understand 
Alan  Joddrel.     He  had  led  an  active  out-of-door  life, 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  143 

and  was  a  lover  of  adventure.  But  Charles  Lorimer 
had  always  lived  a  conventional  life;  a  large  sum,  not 
raised  latterly  without  sacrifice,  had  been  spent  on  his 
education;  and  he  could  not  have  helped  knowing  how 
difficult  a  start  in  life  is  for  one  in  his  position,  how 
precarious  his  chances,  how  necessary  are  prudence 
and  the  thrifty  use  of  opportunity.  Yet  he  had  sac- 
rificed everything  to  be  a  soldier.  On  what  motive? 
Certainly  not  from  a  spirit  of  romance  or  adventure — 
his  plain  honest  face  contradicted  that  theory.  Yet 
some  sudden  heat  of  the  soul  had  been  his,  some  com- 
pelling vision Was  it  an  unconscious  prophetic 

sense  that  the  very  destiny  of  his  country  was  at  stake? 
Was  it  a  conviction,  which  he  could  neither  have  for- 
mulated nor  explained,  that  the  very  life  of  England 
was  in  peril,  that  all  that  the  world  held  as  most  sacred 
and  most  precious  was  in  the  balance  ? 

Whatever  it  was,  the  motive  was  not  mine.  Not 
mine  this  sudden  heat  of  soul,  this  overmastering  im- 
pulse     It  was  vain  to  ask  why.     The  wind  blows 

where  it  listeth,  and  who  can  order  its  goings?  One 
man  it  passes  by,  and  in  another  man  it  finds  a  tiny 
spark  that  it  can  winnow  into  flame.  All  I  could 
say  was  that  the  wind  had  not  found  me.  I  could 
find  no  better  answer  than  the  Master  of  all  wisdom 
found,  when  he  said  that  many  are  called  but  few 
chosen. 

One  night,  as  we  sat  round  the  fire,  Mrs.  Lorimer 
suddenly  broke  the  reserve  and  began  to  talk  about 
her  son. 

A  letter  had  come  from  him  that  day,  saying  that 


144  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

he  expected  to  be  somewhere  in  France  by  the  end  of 
the  year.  On  the  table  in  the  hall  was  a  pile  of  par- 
cels meant  for  him — books,  cigarettes,  wool  helmets 
and  socks.  Grace  had  returned  from  New  York  bring- 
ing with  her  the  latest  chapters  of  my  book  which 
she  had  type-written  in  the  office.  She  handed  me  the 
manuscript  after  dinner  with  a  bright  smile  and  the 
remark  that  she  thought  the  new  chapters  excellent. 
It  was  at  this  moment  that  Mrs.  Lorimer  put  in  her 
hand  the  letter  from  Charles  that  had  come  that  morn- 
ing. 

"A  letter  from  Charles,"  she  cried;  "why  didn't 
you  show  it  to  me  before?"  , 

"Read  it,"  said  Mrs.  Lorimer, 

She  turned  pale,  and  her  hand  trembled  as  she 
opened  the  envelope. 

I  took  up  my  manuscript  and  was  about  to  leave 
the  room  when  Mrs.  Lorimer  said,  "Don't  go.  I 
should  like  you  to  hear  it  too.  Grace,  dear,  won't  you 
read  it  aloud?" 

The  letter  was  very  brief,  a  boyish  letter,  full  of  high 
spirits.  "I  shall  be  jolly  glad  to  go,"  it  ended,  "for 
I'm  fed  up  with  drill  and  marching.  I  long  to  be 
doing  something.  Of  course  I  can't  tell  you  when  we 
go,  but  I  know  it  will  be  before  the  New  Year.  Please 
remember  always  that  I'm  glad  to  go,  and  don't  worry 
over  me.  All  I'm  afraid  of  is  that  the  fighting  will 
be  over  before  I  get  there,  and  that's  how  we  all  feel." 

A  silence  fell  with  the  reading  of  the  letter.  Mrs. 
Lorimer  sat  with  her  handkerchief  to  her  eyes.  Grace 
stood  dry-eyed  gazing  into  the  fire.     Mary  Lorimer 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  145 

stood  a  little  apart  from  us  in  the  shadows,  silent  and 
sullen. 

"O,  I  can't  bear  to  think  of  it,"  said  Grace. 

Mrs.  Lorimer  lifted  up  a  tear-stained  face  and  said, 
"If  I  can  bear  it,  you  should,  my  dear." 

"It's  the  waste  that  horrifies  me,"  said  Grace  with 
a  low  voice. 

"And  do  you  think  I  don't  realise  that,"  her  mother 
replied. 

"Yes,  I  know  you  do,  mother,  but  in  some  ways  it's 
harder  for  me  than  it  is  for  you.  You've  lived  your 
life,  and  after  all  you've  had  a  good  deal  of  joy  in  it. 
Charles  has  had  nothing  but  hard  work  and  self-denial. 
He's  just  got  to  the  point  where  success  is  within  his 
grasp,  and  now  he  must  throw  it  all  away.  And  I 
always  counted  on  living  with  him  when  he  succeeded. 
He's  counted  on  it  too.  Every  day  I've  toiled  in  that 
hateful  New  York  I've  consoled  myself  with  the 
thought  that  I  did  it  for  him,  that  some  day  I  could  go 
back  to  London  and  help  him  in  his  career.  And  now 
all  he's  done  goes  for  nothing.     He  is  to  be  wasted." 

"My  dear,  you  mustn't  think  like  that " 

"But  I  do,"  interrupted  Grace.  "I'm  not  a  pacifist. 
I  know  there  must  be  wars.  I  know  there  must  be 
armies.  But  aren't  there  plenty  of  men  who  are  ex- 
actly fitted  to  be  soldiers  without  taking  boys  like 
Charles?  They're  taking  the  best  for  the  war,,  the 
gentlest,  the  most  loveable,  the  best  educated.  I  heard 
Mr.  Herridge  say  to-day  that  if  the  war  goes  on  much 
longer  all  the  best  men  of  every  nation  will  be  killed. 
There   will  be   left   only   what  he   calls   'the   runts.' 


146  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

There'll  be  no  art,  and  no  music  and  no  literature  for 
a  generation.  All  the  fine  minds  will  be  extinguished, 
and  it'll  take  a  generation  to  grow  others.  That's 
what  he  said,  and  he's  right.  We're  wasting  all  our 
best  brains  and  blood.  I  know  Charles  isn't  a  genius, 
but  he's  a  thousand  times  too  good  for  cannon-fodder." 

I  was  amazed  at  this  sudden  flash  of  passion  in  a 
person  so  gentle  as  Grace  Lorimer.  She  had  gone 
about  her  work  in  the  office  with  such  quiet  industry, 
she  appeared  so  cheerful  and  contented,  that  I  had 
given  her  no  credit  for  thoughts  of  her  own.  And  I 
could  not  but  realise  that  in  expressing  these  thoughts 
she  was  not  thinking  only  of  her  brother.  She  was 
consciously  or  unconsciously  stating  my  case.  She 
was  offering  an  implied  defence  for  me. 

The  horror  of  waste — was  not  that  one  of  the  keen- 
est sensations  which  the  war  had  brought  to  me?  I 
had  feared  to  waste  my  gift,  to  sacrifice  my  career — 
there  was  no  doubt  of  that.  It  was  true  I  had  justi- 
fication. I  had  believed  the  war  would  end  in  De- 
cember. I  had  signed  the  contract  which  tied  me  for 
six  months  in  that  belief.  But  if  I  had  felt  as  Charles 
Lorimer  felt  I  should  not  have  signed  such  an  agree- 
ment. And  I  saw  now  that  at  the  back  of  my  thoughts 
lay  this  egoistic  conviction  that  I  was  too  good  to  be 
wasted  in  the  indiscriminate  massacre  of  war.  Her- 
ridge  had  talked  in  that  way,  and,  while  I  tepidly  dis- 
sented, I  had  seen  nothing  ignoble  in  the  idea. 

Mary  Lorimer  suddenly  spoke.  She  stepped  out  of 
the  shadows,  her  dark  brows  drawn  over  her  smoul- 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  147 

dering  eyes,  her  plain  strong  face  illumined,  and  her 
hoarse  contralto  voice  vibrant  with  contempt, 

"You  were  always  selfish,  Grace,"  she  said,  "and 
you're  selfish  now.  One  for  Charles,  and  two  for 
yourself — that's  what  it  comes  to.  You  don't  care  a 
fig  for  Charles'  honour,  or  the  big  motives  which  make 
him  a  hero — all  you  remember  is  you're  losing  some- 
thing you  wanted  to  have,  something  on  which  you'd 
set  your  heart " 

"It  isn't  that,"  cried  Grace.  "It's  the  wasting  of  his 
life." 

"And  what's  that  amount  to?"  interrupted  Mary. 
"Doesn't  it  all  come  to  this,  that  common  men  should 
die  for  their  country — that's  only  right,  because  they're 
common.  The  farm-labourer  and  the  artisan — let  them 
die,  they're  of  no  account.  There  are  thousands  of 
them,  thousands  on  thousands,  and  they  can  be  easily 
replaced.  But  because  a  man  is  well  educated  and 
wears  good  clothes,  he  must  be  excused.  He's  too  fine 
to  be  a  patriot,  except  in  words.  Let  the  common  men 
die  for  him ;  that's  quite  proper " 

"No,  no,  I  never  meant  that." 

"That's  what  it  means,  just  the  same.  Because  a 
man  can  play  a  piano  better  than  anybody  else,  or  write 
a  poem,  or  even  have  a  chance  of  being  a  decent  arch- 
itect, he  must  suffer  no  inconvenience  by  the  war.  His 
precious  blood  must  not  be  spilt,  not  even  a  thimble- 
full  of  it.  Christ  didn't  think  Himself  too  good  to  go 
to  the  Cross,  but  a  puppy  in  a  Bond  Street  coat  does." 

"Mary,  Mary,  please  don't  be  profane,"  pleaded 
Mrs.  Lorimer. 


148  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I'm  not  profane,  mother.  There's  a  poem  some- 
where that  speaks  of  'the  Christs  of  the  barricades.' 
That's  what  I  mean.  I'd  rather  be  the  commonest 
man  in  a  trench  or  dying  on  a  barricade  than  the  most 
uncommon  genius  who  goes  on  eating  his  three  meals 
a  day  in  comfort  while  other  men  are  dying  for  him." 

"You're  glad  that  Charles  is  going  to  the  trenches," 
sneered  Grace. 

"Yes,  I  am  glad.  He'll  find  the  noblest  company 
in  the  world  there.  Waste  indeed !  What  right  have 
we  to  complain  of  waste  when  the  best  men  of  Eng- 
land have  gone,  men  a  hundred  times  cleverer  than 
Charles,  men  whose  lives  were  of  immense  value  to 
the  nation,  for  they  bore  great  names,  and  had  the 
greatest  gifts. — O,  it  makes  me  sick,  this  talk  about 
waste!  It's  only  cowards  who  make  prudent  calcula- 
tions whether  they  ought  to  be  wasted.  Brave  men 
don't  think  of  themselves,  or  their  own  value.  They 
just  go." 

Mrs.  Lorimer  rose  from  her  chair.  She  was  tall, 
like  her  daughters,  and  her  black  widow's  dress  gave 
her  a  pathetic  stateliness. 

"I  will  not  permit  you  to  quarrel,"  she  said. 

"I  don't  wish  to  quarrel,"  said  Mary.  "But  I  hate 
to  think  that  while  Charles  is  giving  everything  to  the 
cause,  we  should  grudge  giving  him.  We  should  be 
proud  to  let  him  go." 

"I  know  that,"  she  answered.  "I  think  I  can  say  I 
feel  it  too.  I  did  not  feel  it  when  he  enlisted.  I  was 
just  as  bitterly  resentful  then  as  Grace  is  now,  and 
for  the  same  reason.    But  I've  prayed  over  it.     Many 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  149 

nights  when  you  girls  were  sleeping  I've  been  praying. 
He's  my  only  son.  Much  as  you  may  love  him,  you 
can't  love  him  as  I  do.  I've  thought  a  thousand  times 
of  those  limbs  I  nursed  when  he  was  a  baby  torn  and 
maimed  on  a  battlefield.  I've  tortured  myself  with 
that  vision  till  I  thought  I  should  go  mad.  But  when 
his  letter  came  this  morning  I  became  calm  in  mind, 
quite  suddenly.  I  realised  his  heroism,  and  I  saw  the 
only  thing  for  me  was  to  try  to  be  worthy  of  it.  I 
can't  say  I'm  glad  that  he  should  go — no,  no,  I  can't 
say  that.  But  I  can  say  I'm  content.  I've  given  him 
up,  and  I  think  there's  a  kind  of  happiness  growing  up 
in  me Don't  spoil  it,  my  dear  girls.  It's  a  diffi- 
cult happiness;  don't  make  it  more  difficult." 

She  took  up  a  little  soberly  bound  volume  that  lay 
upon  the  table. 

"There's  a  verse  here,"  she  said,  "which  I  came  on 
by  accident  to-day.  It  helped  me  so  much,  I've  been 
saying  it  over  to  myself  all  day, 

*Born  to  be  wasted,  even  so 

And  doomed  to  feel  and  lift  no  voice, 
Yet  not  unblest,  because  I  know 
So  many  other  souls  rejoice.' " 

"Let  me  see  it,"  cried  Mary. 

She  took  the  little  grey  book,  published  anony- 
mously, written  by  some  one  of  whom  nothing  is 
known  except  that  he  suffered  and  drew  strength  from 
his  sorrow. 

"Ah,"  she  said,  "here's  a  better  verse  still, 


I50  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Waste,  waste,  each  knoweth  his  own  worth 
And  would  be  something,  ere  he  sink 

To  silence,  ere  he  mix  with  earth, 
And  part  with  love,  and  cease  to  think.* 

It  means,  doesn't  it,  that  every  man  wants  to  do  some- 
thing worthy  before  he  dies,  and  that's  what  Charles 
is  doing." 

Grace  hfted  a  tear-stained  face,  and  silently  knelt 
beside  her  mother's  chair. 

"Yes,  I  suppose  that  is  true,"  she  said  slowly.  "But 
O,  it's  hard.  Mother,  dear,  forgive  me  if  I've  grieved 
you." 

I  stole  out  of  the  room,  carrying  with  me  a  picture 
in  my  mind,  pathetic,  sublime,  ineffaceable.  I  thought 
I  should  like  to  see  that  picture  painted  by  one  who 
understood  it,  with  a  dark  cross-crowned  hill  for 
background,  and  three  rays  of  light  falling  from  a  rift 
in  the  clouds  on  those  three  faces;  Mrs.  Lorimer,  the 
Mother  through  whose  heart  the  sword  has  passed, 
Mary  the  prophetess,  Grace  the  penitent. 


II 

I  couldn't  sleep  that  night. 

There  are  times  when  the  deep  silence  of  the  coun- 
try is  a  greater  enemy  to  sleep  than  all  the  tumult  of 
a  city.  The  silence  itself  seems  to  vibrate  with  sound, 
like  a  gong  softly  struck  by  an  indefatigable  hand.  A 
board  creaks,  a  blind  flutters,  a  twig  upon  the  tree  out- 
side the  window  breaks,  and  each  sound  has  the  vio- 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  151 

lence  of  an  explosion.  I  rose  and  looked  out  of  the 
open  window.  A  large  yellow  moon  was  sinking  be- 
hind the  silent  woods.  Far  away  a  clock  struck  mid- 
night. It  was  as  though  the  Night  itself,  dark-robed 
and  ample-bosomed,  called  to  me.  A  warm  soft  breeze 
was  abroad.  It  came  in  gentle  gusts,  regularly  timed, 
like  breathing.  I  drew  on  a  heavy  frieze  coat,  and 
thought,  since  I  could  not  sleep,  I  would  go  out  and  sit 
on  the  verandah. 

I  went  downstairs  on  tiptoe.  A  small  bead  of  light 
burned  in  the  hall,  and  on  the  table  lay  the  Christmas 
presents  that  were  to  find  Charles  Lorimer  in  the  camp 
or  in  the  trendies.  The  thought  struck  me  that  I  had 
sent  him  nothing;  I  would  do  so  to-morrow.  For  all 
I  knew  the  same  moon  that  hung  like  a  lamp  over  these 
quiet  woods  might  at  this  hour  be  lighting  the  sea  on 
which  he  sailed  to  France.  There  was  romance  in  the 
thought.  Kipling's  lines  about  putting  out  on  the 
Long  Trail  rang  through  my  memory,  and  for  a  mo- 
ment I  keenly  wished  myself  with  Charles.  I  saw  the 
ship,  packed  with  silent  men,  pushing  through  the  si- 
lent waves,  with  black  blunt-nosed  destroyers  leading 
and  following,  and  I  wondered  how  it  would  feel  to 
leave  behind  the  twice-breathed  air  of  cities  on  a  lone 
adventure.     After  all,  was  not  Charles  to  be  envied? 

To  my  surprise,  the  door  leading  to  the  verandah 
was  already  unlatched.  I  opened  it  cautiously  and 
stepped  out.  At  first  I  saw  nothing  but  the  dark  trees, 
with  the  moon  caught  in  their  upper  branches,  and 
the  colourless  space  of  lawn.  Then,  at  the  end  of  the 
verandah,  I  became  conscious  of  a  standing  figure. 


152  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

The  figure  turned  at  the  sound  of  my  footsteps,  and 
I  recognised  Mary  Lorimer. 

She  stood  quite  silent,  her  face  ivory-pale  in  the 
moonlight,  waiting  for  me  to  speak. 

"I'm  sorry  if  I  disturb  you — "  I  said  lamely,  "but 
I  could  not  sleep." 

"Nor  I,"  she  answered. 

"May  I  sit  down?" 

"If  you  like.    The  house  is  as  much  yours  as  mine," 

"Please  don't  be  offended,"  I  said. 

"I'm  not  offended.  On  the  contrary,  I  think  I'm 
more  amiable  than  usual.  I've  been  here  an  hour  and 
the  silence  has  done  me  good." 

There  was  much  more  cordiality  in  her  voice  than 
I  had  ever  heard  there.  I  had  called  it  a  hoarse  con- 
tralto, but  I  recognised  now  a  certain  sweetness  in  the 
hoarseness — a  powerful  voice,  if  one  may  use  the 
term,  muffled  in  honey. 

"But  you  came  to  be  alone,  no  doubt,"  she  said  ab- 
ruptly.    "So  I  will  go." 

"Please  don't,"  I  said.    "I  would  like  to  talk." 

"About  what?" 

"I  don't  know." 

"Then  don't  try.  Why  not  be  silent?  I  won't  dis- 
turb you." 

"Suppose  you  were  to  tell  me  what  you  have  been 
thinking  of  while  you've  been  out  here  alone,  and 
I'll  tell  you  the  thoughts  that  made  me  sleepless,"  I 
said. 

"Why  should  I?    You  wouldn't  understand." 

"I've  more  faith  in  your  discernment  than  you  in 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  153 

mine  then,  I  think  if  I  told  you  my  thoughts,  you 
would  understand." 

"Why?  You  don't  really  know  anything  about  me. 
For  that  matter  no  one  in  this  house  really  knows 
me.  Some  persons  are  naturally  solitary.  Do  you 
understand  that?" 

"Not  some  persons,  but  all  persons,  Mary.  Our 
souls  live  alone." 

"And  you  want  me  to  expose  my  soul  to  you  ?  Why 
should  I?" 

She  laughed  scornfully. 

"What  a  boy  you  are,"  she  added. 

"And  aren't  you  a  girl?" 

"O  dear  no,"  she  replied.  "It's  a  great  many  years 
since  I  was  a  girl.  I'm  quite  old.  I  assure  you  that 
midnight  and  moonlight  and  proximity  on  a  verandah 
with  a  nice  boy  don't  stir  me  at  all.  But  if  it  will 
please  you  to  know  what  I  was  thinking  of  just  before 
you  came  out  so  opportunely,  I  don't  mind  telling  you. 
I  was  thinking  of  you." 

"What  were  you  thinking?" 

"I  was  wondering  how  long  you  proposed  to  live  in 
Oakwood." 

She  stretched  out  her  hands  suddenly  to  the  waning 
moon,  and  added  irrelevantly,  "How  long,  O  Lord, 
how  long?" 

"I'm  afraid  I  don't  understand." 

"O  yes  you  do,"  she  said  in  a  passionate  whisper. 
"My  brother  is  going  to  France,  and  you  are  here — • 
isn't  that  enough?  You  heard  what  Grace  said  to- 
night about  waste.     Are  you  one  of  those  who  think 


154  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

yourself  too  precious  to  be  wasted?  You  didn't  say 
a  word.  You've  invited  me  to  expose  to  you  my  soul. 
I'll  be  suitor  now.  Show  me  your  soul.  I'm  very 
curious  to  see  it." 

"I  can't,  if  you  mean  to  put  me  on  my  defence," 
I  said  angrily. 

"I  don't  wish  to  do  that.  Indeed  I  don't.  But  I 
think  you  must  have  something  you  would  like  to  say. 
And  since  you  yourself  have  asked  confidence  for  con- 
fidence why  not  speak  freely  to  me?" 

Thus  adjured  I  did  what  every  young  man  does 
when  a  woman  offers  to  be  his  confessor.  I  told  her 
all  about  my  position,  my  literary  ambitions,  my  con- 
tract with  Herridge,  my  expectation  of  the  rapid  end 
of  the  war,  my  disillusionment,  my  uneasiness  of  spirit, 
my  desperate  attempts  to  fix  my  mind  upon  my  work, 
and  the  growing  sense  I  had  of  the  converging  force 
of  events  that  threatened  my  plans. 

"It's  like  a  sea  that  rises  slowly  round  a  man  on  a 
solitary  rock,"  I  concluded.  "He  holds  on  desperately, 
but  he  knows  very  well  that  every  moment  makes  it 
more  certain  that  he  will  be  washed  off." 

"No  wonder  you  couldn't  sleep,"  she  said  in  a  low 
voice,  when  I  had  done.  "And  I  couldn't  sleep  for 
just  the  same  reasons." 

"You?"  I  cried. 

"Yes,"  she  answered.  "I'm  clinging  to  a  rock  too — 
my  domestic  duties,  and  I  know  I'm  going  to  be  washed 
off." 

And  then  she  gave  me  a  rapid  sketch  of  her  posi- 
tion.    Mrs.  Lorimer  depended  on  her  for  everything. 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  155 

It  was  she  who  conducted  the  afifairs  of  the  house, 
ordered  the  meals,  kept  the  accounts.  They  were  far 
from  rich,  and.  there  was  need  for  rigid  economy. 
Mrs.  Lorimer  was  really  in  frail  health,  and  she  had 
brooded  much  over  the  death  of  her  husband,  and  lat- 
terly over  the  enlistment  of  her  son.  She  had  at- 
tained at  last  a  difficult  fortitude,  but  it  was  precari- 
ous; it  was  a  question  whether  it  could  endure  any 
further  strain.  Grace  was  necessary  to  the  household. 
Her  earnings  made  modest  comfort  possible. 

"Yes,"  said  Mary,  *T  was  unjust  to  Grace  when  I 
called  her  selfish  to-night.  What  I  really  meant  was 
that  she  is  self-centred.  She  isn't  touched  by  the  big- 
ness of  things  outside  her  own  life,  her  own  affections. 
I'm  different.  Grace  can't  look  over  the  wall  of  her 
own  life;  fortunately  or  unfortunately,  I  can.  And 
what  I  see  is  this;  that  the  hour  has  come  when  not 
only  every  man  but  every  woman  must  share  in  this 
conflict.  I  must  go.  I  don't  know  how  or  when — it's 
all  dark  to  me;  but  I  know  I  must  go.  And  so  now 
you  know  why  I  couldn't  sleep  to-night." 

"But  what  could  you  do  if  you  went?  Aren't  there 
things  you  could  do  without  going  ?  Things  that  would 
help?" 

"Please  don't  remind  me  of  woman's  inefficiency," 
she  said  bitterly.  "And  please  don't  tell  me  I  can 
knit  socks  for  soldiers,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing. 
That's  very  well  for  old  women  who  can  do  nothing 
else.  I'm  young  and  strong.  And  thank  God,  I'm 
plain.  Mother  won't  be  able  to  plead  the  moral  dan- 
ger of  an  unprotected  loveliness  when  I  tell  her." 


156  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

She  stood  very  erect,  gazing  at  the  waning  moon, 
her  hands  clasped  behind  her.  The  pale  light,  the 
deep  shadows,  the  silence,  lent  a  touch  of  grandeur  to 
her  attitude.  Presently  she  said  in  a  low  voice,  as 
though  addressing  some  spiritual  presences  she  saw 
in  the  shadows  of  the  garden,  "This  is  my  chance. 
My  one  great  chance.  I  will  not  let  it  be  taken  from 
me. 

"Your  chance?"  I  repeated. 

"Yes,  and  yours  too,"  she  replied,  moving  toward 
me,  and  laying  her  cold  hand  on  mine.  Don't  you  un- 
derstand? We've  all  been  living  little  lives.  Little, 
tame,  colourless,  quite  uneventful  lives — what  they  call 
exemplary  lives — perfectly  virtuous  and  dutiful.     But 

0  such  tame  virtues,  such  small  duties!  Doing  the 
same  things  every  day,  and  with  no  prospect  but  to 
go  on  doing  the  same  things  till  we  die — old  men  and 
old  women  who  have  never  truly  lived.  Like  pale 
soft-fleshed  prisoners  in  the  Bastille,  with  nothing  bet- 
ter to  do  than  kill  time  the  best  way  we  can  by  making 
toys.  And  now  the  walls  have  fallen  down,  and  all 
the  world's  aflame!  We  can  get  out!  We've  dis- 
covered that  there  is  a  big  thing  to  live  for.  Don't  you 
want  to  get  out?    I  do.     It's  my  one  great  chance,  as 

1  said.  I  never  thought  it  would  come.  I  didn't  see 
how  it  could.  But  it  has  come,  and  I  find  myself  out- 
side the  walls  of  my  Bastille.  And  I'm  never  going 
back,  never.  The  women  are  all  coming  out  every- 
where. They've  suddenly  found  a  new  world,  where 
they  can  do  bigger  things  than  knit  and  sew.  Aren't 
you  coming  out  too?" 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  157 

The  hoarse  sweet  voice,  with  its  deep  contralto  notes, 
thrilled  me. 

"I've  told  you  my  thoughts,"  she  said.  "You  asked 
for  them.     What  about  your  own  ?" 

"I  think  they're  like  yours,"  I  replied,  "but  they're 
not  so  definite." 

"O  no,  that  won't  do,"  she  retorted.  "When  a 
thought  isn't  definite  it  isn't  sincere." 

"Well  then,  here's  the  plain  truth.  I  know  very  well 
I'm  going  to  be  washed  off  my  rock,  and  I  don't  want 
to  be." 

"Is  that  all?  Why,  that's  nothing.  Of  course  no 
one  wants  to  be  washed  off  his  rock.  I  don't  want 
to  leave  mother.  You  don't  want  to  leave  the  life 
you're  living.  But  isn't  that  just  the  personal  element 
— isn't  there  a  bigger  impersonal  element  at  work? 
I'm  not  very  pious,  and  judging  you  by  your  writings, 
I  don't  think  you  are.  But  there's  one  thing  Christ 
said  that  has  deeply  impressed  me,  because  it  has  in 
it  the  seed  of  all  heroism.  He  said  the  cause  for 
which  He  stood  was  so  much  greater  than  the  most 
sacred  personal  affections,  that  the  man  who  wasn't 
willing  to  sacrifice  father  and  mother,  and  lands  and 
houses  for  the  cause  wasn't  worthy  of  Him." 

"But  this  cause?" 

"It's  as  big  as  the  cause  Christ  died  for.  It's  so 
big  that  no  sacrifice  we  can  make  for  it  is  too  great. 
We  mustn't  be  dragged  to  it.  We  must  go,  and  go 
gladly,  as  Charles  has  done,  as  multitudes  of  others 
are  going." 

Her  voice  broke  upon  her  brother's  name. 


158  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I've  little  right  to  advise  you,  and  still  less  to  re- 
proach you,"  she  continued.  "Forgive  me.  But  I've 
been  watching  you  ever  since  you  came  to  live  with  us. 
I  know  you  haven't  liked  me — I  could  see  that.  After 
what  I've  said  to-night  perhaps  you  will  like  me  less, 
But,  believe  me,  why  I've  been  interested  in  you  ik 
that  I've  been  waiting  to  see  you  do  the  heroic  thing. ** 

"I'm  afraid  I'm  a  poor  hero,"  I  interposed. 

"No,  I  won't  have  that.  But,  you  aren't  quite  awako 
yet — that's  all.     You  haven't  heard  the  call." 

In  the  distance  the  church  clock  struck  one.  The 
moon  had  sunk,  and  with  the  sinking  a  deeper  silence 
fell,  as  if  the  last  symbol  of  life  itself  had  disappeared. 

The  call !  It  seemed  to  travel  toward  me  out  of  that 
intense  stillness.  A  whisper,  a  vibration,  thin  and 
clear :  it  came  not  as  an  imagined  echo  of  distant  bat- 
tlefields, but  in  that  last  dying  cadence  of  the  striking 
hour,  which  proclaimed  the  birth  of  a  new  day.  It 
came  in  a  sudden  freshness  of  the  air,  a  sense  of  old 
things  put  away,  of  new  occasions,  of  a  kind  of  inar- 
ticulate dedication  to  these  new  demands  and  duties. 

A  window,  closed  above  us,  witnessed  that  some 
one  in  the  sleeping  house  was  wakeful.  The  spell  was 
broken, 

"We  must  go,"  said  Mary. 

And  then,  with  a  swift  reversion  to  her  natural  tone 
of  irony,  she  added,  "What  will  Grace  think  if  she 
has  heard  us  whispering  here!" 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  159 

III 

That  night  I  had  a  vision. 

I  do  not  call  it  a  dream,  for  in  dreams  there  is  usu- 
ally some  absurd  or  illogical  element,  as  if  Puck  played 
tricks  with  the  machinery  of  the  brain.  In  the  vision 
I  had  there  was  a  clearness  and  sequence,  which  made 
it  a  revelation  of  reality. 

I  had  the  sense  of  emerging  from  a  great  depth  as 
one  does  after  diving.  The  darkness  thinned  round 
me  into  soft  green  light,  and  I  found  myself  stand- 
insr  on  the  verandah  of  the  ranch  house  at  Fruitvale. 
All  was  as  I  had  seen  it  so  often — the  lake  sparkling 
in  the  breeze,  the  mountains  ranged  orderly  around 
the  ranch,  the  blue- jacketed  Chinamen  working  in  the 
shadows  of  the  apple-trees,  the  flash  of  water  in  the 
runnel  at  the  door.  I  heard  the  chug  of  a  launch  upon 
the  lake,  and  began  to  watch  eagerly  the  path  that  ran 
down  the  ranch  to  the  wharf  which  was  concealed 
beneath  the  hill.  Some  one  was  coming.  I  could  hear 
voices  and  the  sound  of  a  drum. 

Up  the  path  came  a  small  childish  woman,  clothed  in 
black.  Beside  her  ran  a  little  boy,  wearing  a  red  cloth 
jacket,  a  peaked  soldier's  hat,  and  beating  a  toy  drum. 
Behind  them  moved  a  man  in  khaki  whom  I  recog- 
nised. It  was  Alan  Joddrel.  I  knew  that  the  woman 
was  his  wife,  and  the  child  his  son. 

The  child  ran  forward  to  meet  me,  crying,  "My 
father's  a  soldier.  I'm  going  to  be  a  soldier  too,  when 
I'm  old  enough,  and  kill  Germans." 

The  woman  came  forward  and  smiled.     I  saw  that 


i6o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

her  dress  was  shabby,  and  that  her  face  was  pale  and 
careworn.  Her  smile  had  no  joy  in  it.  It  was  a  smile 
of  the  lips  only,  but  the  eyes  were  dark  and  brooding. 

"He's  always  saying  that,"  she  said.  "I  wish  he 
wouldn't,  but  I  can't  prevent  him." 

"You  are  Mrs.  Joddrel?"  I  said. 

"Yes,  I  often  heard  Alan  speak  of  you,  and  once 
you  promised  to  come  and  stay  with  us,  but  you  didn't 
come,  and  so  we  never  met." 

I  remembered  the  circumstance.  I  had  gone  up  the 
Coast  in  a  small  steamer,  intending  to  visit  Alan;  but 
I  discovered  that  there  would  be  no  return  boat  for 
a  week,  and  so  gave  up  my  plan. 

"I  am  very  glad  to  meet  you  now,"  I  said. 

Her  lips  quivered,  and  she  said  in  a  low  voice,  "Yes, 
I  wanted  to  see  you.  I  have  been  very  lonely  since 
Alan  died." 

"Alan  dead !"  I  cried.    "Why,  Alan " 

I  stopped,  for  not  more  than  twenty  yards  away 
stood  Alan.  He  was  looking  at  me  intently,  and  ap- 
peared to  beckon  me. 

"Yes,  he  died  a  month  ago,"  she  continued.  "He 
was  with  the  Princess  Pats.    He  was  killed  in  action." 

The  child  heard  the  words,  and  began  to  beat  his 
drum  again.  He  marched  up  and  down  crying,  "I 
want  to  be  a  soldier  and  kill  Germans.  They  killed 
my  Papa." 

I  had  a  swift  extraordinary  impression  that  neither 
Mrs.  Joddrel  nor  his  child  saw  Alan.  I  could  see  him 
as  distinctly  as  I  ever  saw  him.  He  was  quite  unal- 
tered except  that  his  ruddy  colour  was  diminished,  and 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  i6i 

he  wore  the  short  cropped  moustache  of  the  army  of- 
ficer. He  stood  just  outside  the  fence  that  enclosed 
the  Httle  garden,  leaning  on  it,  as  if  tired. 

The  child  caught  sight  of  a  butterfly,  and  ran  down 
the  hill,  pursuing  it.  His  mother  went  after  him,  and 
both  slowly  faded  out  of  sight.  They  passed  Alan 
without  a  glance. 

I  walked  across  the  lawn,  and  stood  beside  the  fence, 
face  to  face  with  Alan. 

"Why,  Alan,"  I  exclaimed.  "What's  this?  Your 
wife  said  you  were  dead." 

"Yes,  that's  what  they  call  it,"  he  replied,  "but  I 
don't  feel  dead." 

"She  said  you  were  killed  in  action.     Is  that  true?" 

"I  suppose  so.  It  was  at  Ypres.  Something  hap- 
pened to  me  there.  We  went  over  the  top  and  I  was 
wounded.  I  was  being  carried  out  when  a  shell  fell. 
I  can  remember  nothing  more.  There  was  a  tremen- 
dous noise,  and  then  a  great  darkness,  and  then  I  was 
alone,  and  very  happy." 

"Happy?" 

"Yes,  but  in  a  new  kind  of  way.  Did  you  ever, 
when  you  were  a  boy,  run  down  a  hill,  jumping  as  you 
went,  until  you  felt  as  though  your  feet  were  wings? 
Do  you  recall  the  feeling?  Well,  it  was  like  that  I 
felt.  A  sense  of  lightness  and  release — a  sudden 
power  of  doing  extraordinary  things — of  being  free 
and  strong —  And  I  was  so  tired  just  before.  I  had 
tried  to  run  in  the  mud  and  couldn't.  It  sucked  me 
down,  and  I  was  plastered  with  it.  And  now  I  could 
run  and  leap —    It  was  as  though  I  could  run  along 


1 62  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

the  tops  of  the  clouds.  They  were  white :  it  was  Hke 
running  over  snow  when  the  surface  is  hard  with  frost 
and  ghttering." 

"My  poor  Alan!"  I  exclaimed. 

He  shook  his  head  and  said.  "No,  no,  you  must  not 
pity  me.  You  see,  I've  found  out  a  great  thing,  that 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  death.  There's  dying,  but 
that's  nothing.  It's  really  passing.  Like  going  through 
a  mist,  and  coming  out  on  the  other  side  into  sun- 
shine. And  you  see,  it's  you  that  go  through,  all  of 
you.  And  you  mustn't  think  I'm  sorry,  and  you 
mustn't  be  sorry  for  me.  That's  what  I  wanted  to 
tell  you.  And  I  want  you  to  keep  my  wife  from  being 
sorry.     Tell  her  it's  all  right." 

"I'm  afraid  I  can't  do  that,  Alan.  To  me  it  seems 
all  wrong,  O,  so  bitterly  wrong." 

"You  mustn't  think  that,"  he  said  solemnly.  "But 
I  know  why  you  think  it — it's  because  you've  not  yet 
become  a  soldier.  But  one  day  you'll  be  one  of  us, 
and  then  you'll  see  things  as  we  do." 

A  wonderful  light  filled  his  face  as  he  spoke.  "Yes, 
you'll  be  one  of  us,  and  before  long  I  think.  We, 
whom  you  call  the  dead,  will  come  and  fetch  you.  We 
want  you  so  much  to  take  our  places.  There's  an  old 
tag  of  Latin  which  I  learned  at  school — it's  about  all 
I  remember  of  Latin — it's  Horace,  isn't  it — Dulce  ct 
decorum 

"Yes,  that's  it.  Sweet  and  glorious  it  is  to  die  for 
one's  country — that's  what  it  means,  isn't  it?  Well, 
I've  proved  it.    And  that's  why  I'm  happy." 

All  at  once  a  sound  of  music  filled  the  air,  as  of 


THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOOD  163 

a  hidden  choir  in  some  great  cathedral.  It  was  a  gust 
of  melody,  blown  from  a  great  distance,  in  which  I 
could  distinguish  the  words  est  pro  patria  mori — sung 
by  fresh  young  voices, 

Alan  stood,  with  his  face  uplifted  to  the  hills,  as  if 
he  heard  it  too. 

"Farewell!"  he  whispered. 

He  turned  his  back  on  me,  and  I  saw  upon  his  tunic 
a  great  rent,  and  a  deep  red  stain. 

I  woke,  with  the  sun  pouring  into  the  room,  and 
heard  the  bell  calling  men  to  matins  in  the  little  church 
hidden  in  the  woods. 


CHAPTER  IV 
ALICE  CROXON 


On  Christmas  day  I  received  two  letters. 

One  was  from  Vernon.  After  giving  me  the  local 
gossip  he  said,  "You  remember  what  I  told  you  about 
Alice,  that  day  when  we  talked  together  on  the  way 
to  the  Lost  Lode  Mine?  Well,  it  seems  her  father's 
affairs  have  taken  a  sudden  turn,  and  he  is  quite  rich 
again.  I  think  it's  steel  or  leather  he's  making  money 
in,  he's  a  great  speculator,  you  know,  and  the  war 
has  given  him  a  great  opportunity.  At  all  events  he's 
on  his  feet  again,  and  richer  than  ever  by  what  I 
can  make  out.  He's  living  at  the  Waldorf  in  fine 
style,  and  he  has  written  to  Alice,  telling  her  to  come 
back  to  New  York  at  once.  Of  course  she  doesn't 
know  the  real  truth  about  his  previous  troubles,  and 
I've  never  given  her  a  hint  of  them;  so  she  takes  it 
as  a  natural  thing  that  her  father  wants  her  back 
in  New  York,  and  promises  her  all  kinds  of  gaiety. 
Personally,  I'm  sorry.  Alice  has  fitted  herself  into 
our  simple  modes  of  life  in  a  wonderful  way,  and  is, 
I  am  sure,  much  happier  here  than  she  ever  was  be- 
fore. She's  lost  her  discontent;  she's  become  natural, 
if  you  understand  what  I  mean.     And  we've  grown 

164 


ALICE  CROXON  165 

very  fond  of  her,  and  shall  feel  parting  with  her  very 
much.  However,  she's  going  back  to  New  York,  and 
no  doubt  you  will  see  her.  You  won't  be  offended, 
I'm  sure,  if  I  wish  you  luck  with  her." 

The  other  was  a  brief  note  from  Alice — the  first 
I  had  ever  had  from  her. 

"Dear  Gareth,"  she  wrote.  "It  is  I  who  should  be 
called  Gareth,  for  I've  stuck  to  the  business  of  dish- 
washing a  good  deal  longer  than  you.  However,  the 
episode  is  closed  for  me  too.  I've  put  away  my  home- 
spun and  am  contemplating  the  delights  of  being 
clothed  in  purple  and  fine  linen.  What  a  comfort  it 
will  be  to  wear  silk  stockings  again,  and  not  be 
ashamed  of  one's  feet!  Whether  I  shall  ever  be  hap- 
pier than  I've  been  here  I  don't  know;  but  I'm  sure 
I  shall  dearly  love  riding  in  a  limousine.  I've 
no  doubt  you  were  equally  glad  to  return  to  civilisa- 
tion again,  though  I  don't  suppose  you  will  admit  it. 
That'll  be  something  to  quarrel  about  when  we  meet, 
won't  it?  And  that  reminds  me  of  what  I  most  want 
to  say,  but  almost  forgot,  that  I  do  really  expect  to 
be  in  New  York  early  in  the  New  Year,  at  the  Wal- 
dorf. We  might  arrange  for  our  amicable  quarrel 
some  day,  if  you  still  are  at  all  interested  in  your  obe- 
dient Lynette." 

I  read  this  letter  with  an  amused  sense  of  its  charm- 
ing casuistry.  It  was  the  typical  casuistry  of  woman, 
who  arrives  at  her  end  by  indirection.  What  she 
meant  was  obvious  enough;  she  wished  to  see  me. 


1 66  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

But  she  could  not  bring  herself  to  say  so  in  plain 
words,  and  so  she  played  with  the  idea  of  Gareth  and 
Lynette,  leaving  me  to  draw  my  own  conclusions. 

These  conclusions  were  not  altogether  happy.  So 
far  as  Alice's  letter  was  concerned,  I  was  happy 
enough;  but  there  was  Vernon's  letter  to  consider.  I 
did  not  at  all  like  the  idea  of  Theodore  Croxon  as  a 
rehabilitated  millionaire.  I  liked  still  less  the  idea 
of  Alice  as  a  millionaire's  daughter.  I  had  seen  her 
as  a  natural  creature,  fresh  and  vivid  with  sincerest 
life;  and  didn't  like  to  think  of  her  wearing  silk  stock- 
ings and  riding  in  a  limousine.  Our  charming  idyll 
of  Gareth  and  Lynette  was  exactly  suited  to  a  camp 
in  the  mountains,  but  I  couldn't  conceive  it  being 
played  out  with  the  Waldorf  for  a  stage.  I  became 
suddenly  conscious  of  a  resentment  against  wealth, 
especially  wealth  gained  in  Theodore  Croxon's  way. 
Why  couldn't  fate  have  left  Alice  poor  ?  She  had  been 
happy  among  poor  folk  like  the  Vernons — it  was  very 
doubtful  if  she  would  be  happy,  or  certainly  as  happy, 
in  the  glitter  of  New  York.  That  Power,  whom  the 
ancients  pictured  as  the  Supreme  Ironist,  had  stuck 
a  clumsy  linger  into  my  affairs,  and  had  played  me  a 
a  scurvy  trick. 

For,  of  course,  my  ultimate  thought,  which  I  didn't 
care  to  examine,  was  that  this  new  wealth  put  a  bar- 
rier between  myself  and  Alice.  We  had  met  in  Eden; 
when  we  met  again  it  would  be  in  Babel.  Our  idyll 
that  seemed  quite  natural  in  Nature's  garden  would 
have  quite  another  aspect  among  the  lofty  towers  of 
Babel.    Love  spoke  with  a  true  accent  in  Eden ;  would 


ALICE  CROXON  167 

it  be  intelligible  in  Babel?  But  there  I  stopped,  with 
a  hearty  wish  that  Theodore  Croxon  had  remained 
smashed,  or,  better  still,  that  he  had  never  existed. 
Parents  are  great  inconveniences.  They  are  worse 
than  inconveniences.  They  are  positive  nuisances 
when  they  interfere  with  love's  purple  dream,  and 
build  barriers  of  gold  round  desirable  and  lovely 
daughters.  What  a  pity  it  is  that  women  don't  grow 
like  flowers,  with  no  troublesome  obligations  of  an- 
cestry to  assert  rights  in  them! 

The  first  letter  one  receives  from  a  woman  he  loves, 
or  thinks  he  loves,  is  an  event,  I  found  myself  go- 
ing over  every  phrase  of  Alice's  letter,  again  and  again, 
trying  to  find  meanings  in  it  which  lay  beneath  the 
surface.  Was  she  merely  ironical  in  her  anticipa- 
tion of  luxury?  Was  she  equally  ironical  in  her  as- 
sumption of  the  name  Lynette?  I  suppose  every  man 
examines  such  a  letter  in  a  spirit  of  wonder  and  un- 
fruitful search.  He  weighs  each  word  which,  in  all 
probability,  the  writer  never  weighed  at  all.  He  tries 
even  to  find  an  indication  of  character  in  the  hand- 
writing. Alice's  hand-writing  was,  if  I  may  use  the 
term,  unsentimental.  It  was  large,  free,  firm,  and 
spread  itself  spaciously  over  the  page.  It  didn't  sug- 
gest romance,  as  the  fine  sloped  writing  of  our  moth- 
ers does.  There  was  nothing  tender,  evasive,  pro- 
vocative about  it;  just  plain  daylight  writing,  a  look- 
the-world-in-the-eyes  sort  of  writing.  There  was  only 
one  thing  about  the  letter  that  gave  it  the  faintest 
aroma  of  a  love-letter;  that  was  the  resumption  of 


i68  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

our  Gareth  and  Lynette  fiction,  which  was  an  invoca- 
tion to  happy  memories. 

Nevertheless  it  stirred  me  deeply,  and  I  became 
aware  how  much  I  had  thought  of  Alice  since  the  day 
I  parted  from  her  at  Fruitvale.  She  had  been  in  all 
my  thoughts  as  a  light,  a  music,  a  hope,  a  goal  of 
effort.  I  had  never  even  thought  of  comparing  her 
with  other  women.  She  stood  apart  from  them.  Not 
that  she  was  greater  or  better;  in  Mary  Lorimer,  for 
example,  I  could  recognise  a  gravity  and  heroic 
strength  of  nature,  very  unusual  in  women.  I  asked, 
as  many  men  have  asked  before  me,  what  was  the 
special  quality  that  makes  one  woman,  not  conspicu- 
ously better  or  fairer  than  other  women,  the  sole  mis- 
tress of  one's  heart,  the  only  woman  at  whose  touch 
the  heart  melts?  And  I  could  find  no  better  answer 
to  the  riddle  than  they.  It's  not  something  to  be 
rationalised;  it's  magic,  it's  charm,  it's  evasive  as  a 
perfume,  it's  not  a  quality  at  all,  but  a  delicate  essence 
of  personality,  unperceived  by  others,  not  meant  for 
others,  recognisable  only  by  the  lover.  In  those  long 
happy  days  at  Fruitvale  I  had  recognised  this  pecu- 
liar appeal  of  Alice's  personality.     Not  continuously 

indeed,  not  very  clearly .    It  had  often  evaded  me. 

It  had  the  volatility  of  a  perfume — it  came  in  sudden 
wafts,  in  swift  penetrating  gusts  of  sweetness.  But 
I  had  felt  it,  and  though  in  colder  hours  of  reflection 
I  had  accused  myself  of  folly  in  yielding  to  it,  yet 
I  knew  that  I  could  never  forget  it. 

As  I  read  her  letter  all  these  indistinct  undefined 
sensations  took  a  sharper  edge.    It  was  borne  in  upon 


ALICE  CROXON  169 

me  that  there  did  exist  between  us  a  secret  compact, 
which  lay  beyond  the  reach  of  outward  circumstance. 
It  was  the  compact  of  interlocking  sympathies,  a  thing 
too  sensitive  and  delicate  for  words,  very  liable  to 
rupture,  yet  holding  the  promise  of  development,  of 
response,  of  the  final  assuagement  of  desire. 


II 

Under  the  charm  of  this  brief  note,  and  the  antici- 
pations which  it  kindled,  my  life  took  a  new  aspect. 
It  was  suffused  with  a  rosy  light.  My  work  went  for- 
ward at  a  great  rate,  and  even  Herridge  expressed 
himself  as  satisfied  with  its  quality.  I  became  gay 
and  cheerful,  and  tried  to  impart  some  of  my  cheer- 
fulness to  the  sombre  Lorimer  household.  Since  the 
night  of  our  conversation  on  the  verandah  Mary  Lori- 
mer had  avoided  me.  She  hung  upon  the  skirts  of 
my  life,  a  menacing  prophetess,  but  she  did  not  in- 
terfere with  me.  I  believe  she  attributed  my  cheer- 
fulness to  the  determination  on  my  part  to  enlist, 
and  she  had  the  kind  of  pride  in  me  which  the  apostle 
has  in  a  new-found  convert.  But  it  was  pride  mixed 
with  fear — the  fear  of  my  backsliding,  and  she 
watched  me  like  a  visible  conscience. 

Of  course  I  couldn't  tell  her  the  reason  of  my  new 
cheerfulness.  Nor  could  I  tell  her  that  the  whole 
subject  of  the  war  had  become  insignificant  to  me. 
I  didn't  know  it  myself.  I  still  followed  its  tragic 
drama  with  an  interest  which  I  thought  sincere.    Yes ; 


i;o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

that  is  the  exact  phrase — it  had  become  a  drama,  and 
I  a  spectator  sitting  in  the  stalls.  It  is  curious  how 
with  the  best  of  us  collective  drama  is  liable  to  com- 
plete displacement  by  personal  drama.  In  the  hour 
when  a  man  loses  some  one  whom  he  has  greatly- 
loved,  all  the  collective  struggle  of  men  is  of  no  im- 
portance; and  it  is  the  same  when  a  man  finds  him- 
self miraculously  possessed  of  love.  His  whole  world 
narrows  itself  into  a  single  intense  emotion.  My 
whole  world  had  become  Alice  Croxon,  and  there  was 
no  room  in  my  mind  for  any  thoughts  that  were  not 
related  to  her. 

It  was  a  wonderful  thing  to  love — a  yet  more  won- 
derful thing  to  imagine  oneself  loved.  Even  Mary 
Lorimer  was  woman  enough  to  know  that,  I  thought. 
I  found  myself  thinking  of  her  with  profound  pity. 
She  was  capable  of  love,  capable  of  an  intense  pas- 
sion; I  knew  enough  of  the  depth  of  her  nature  to 
be  sure  of  that.  And  these  depths  would  never  be 
reached  by  love;  all  the  chances  were  against  her;  and 
her  very  strength  would  resist  the  divine  weakness  of 
love.  In  this,  as  it  turned  out,  I  did  not  know  her. 
But  I  thought  I  did,  and  with  the  serene  egoism  of 
the  lover  pitied  her  for  her  supposed  incapacity  to 
share  emotions  which  I  imagined  peculiar  to  myself. 

In  the  meantime,  I  began  to  be  acutely  anxious  to 
know  what  sort  of  a  person  Theodore  Croxon  was. 

I  asked  Herridge  one  day  whether  he  had  ever 
heard  of  him. 

"Croxon,"  he  said.    "Who  is  he?    Does  he  write?" 

"No,  I  believe  he's  a  millionaire." 


ALICE  CROXON  171 

"Don't  know  any  millionaires,"  he  said  curtly. 
"Not  in  my  line.  But  I  can  find  out  for  you,  if  you 
like." 

He  rang  his  bell,  and  a  little  wizened  bald-headed 
man  named  Rogers  appeared. 

"Rogers  is  my  encyclopjedia  of  unusual  and  gen- 
erally useless  facts,"  Herridge  said  grimly.  "He's  got 
a  mania  for  information,  knows  all  the  baseball  rec- 
ords for  a  decade,  and  all  the  prize-fighters  and  their 
rating  for  a  generation,  Rogers,  this  gentleman 
wants  some  information  about  a  man  called  Theodore 
Croxon.  Wants  to  put  him  in  a  book,  I  suppose. 
Ever  heard  the  name?" 

"Is  he  a  light-weight  or  a  heavy?" 

"No,  he's  only  a  millionaire.     Ever  heard  of  him?" 

"I  can't  say  I  have,  but  I  can  find  out  in  ten  min- 
utes, Mr.  Herridge." 

"All  right.  Go  and  look  in  those  extensive  news- 
paper filings  of  yours.  If  the  man's  any  one  at  all, 
I  daresay  he's  there." 

The  old  man  ambled  off,  polishing  his  bald  head 
with  a  red  silk  handkerchief  as  he  went, 

"That's  a  queer  fellow,"  said  Herridge.  "I  took 
him  over  with  the  office  when  I  came,  and  I've  never 
had  the  heart  to  get  rid  of  him.  He's  spent  his  en- 
tire life  in  cutting  extracts  from  the  newspapers  and 
magazines,  and  filing  them  on  some  elaborate  sys- 
tem of  his  own.  He  says  he's  going  to  leave  his  col- 
lection to  the  nation.  I  believe  it  runs  into  hundreds 
of  volumes.  There's  a  tradition  in  the  office  that  he 
began  life  as  a  brilliant  writer,  but  a  tragedy  happened 


172  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

to  him  which  upset  his  reason.  Didn't  make  him  a 
hinatic,  yon  know;  just  jarred  his  mind  enough  to 
push  it  off  the  rails.  He'd  married  a  beautiful  girl, 
who  was  burned  to  death  upon  her  wedding  night.  A 
filmy  sort  of  wedding-dress  and  a  lighted  match 
dropped  on  it,  I  believe.  That  must  be  forty  years 
ago,  judging  by  his  age.  So  we're  pretty  tender  with 
the  old  fellow\  and  keep  him  on  the  pay-roll,  and 
cheer  him  up  now  and  then  by  letting  him  think  his 
books  of  filings  are  indispensable  to  us." 

The  old  man  came  back  with  a  thick  brown  book 
of  new'spaper  filings  in  his  hands. 

"I  think  I've  found  the  gentleman,"  he  said  proudly. 
"I've  a  perfect  system  of  filing,  first  by  name  letters, 
then  by  dates,  and  then  by  characteristics " 

"Yes,  we  know  that,  Rogers,"  said  Herridge,  not 
unkindly.  "We  all  admire  your  system ;  it's  truly  won- 
derful.    But  please  give  us  your  results." 

"Well,  there  isn't  a  great  deal  to  tell,"  said  Rogers. 
"For  he  doesn't  seem  to  be  what  I  may  call  a  public 
character.  I  find  his  name  first  in  191 1  in  relation 
to  some  land  companies  in  Florida.  It  was  alleged 
that  he  sold  people  farms  that  were  lakes.  There 
was  talk  of  a  prosecution,  but  it  was  dropped.  His 
name  comes  up  again  in  191 3  in  relation  to  the  cot- 
ton market.  It  was  reported  that  he  had  speculated 
wildly  and  got  caught.  That's  all  I've  got  on  my 
files,  but  I  ventured  to  'phone  a  financial  friend  of 
mine,  and  he  says  there's  a  Theodore  Croxon  who  has 
been  busy  in  the  steel  market,  and  is  getting,  or  is 
reported  to  have  got,  large  orders  for  army  shoes  from 


ALICE  CROXON  173 

France.  Rather  a  slippery  kind  of  gentleman,  if  I 
may  say  so,  sir." 

'Thank  you,  Rogers.  You're  really  invaluable,  and 
we're  very  much  obliged  to  you." 

The  old  man  acknowledged  the  compliment  with  a 
little  jerky  bow. 

"Any  time  you  want  me,  you'll  always  find  me 
ready,"  he  said  as  he  shuffled  off. 

This  information  was  distinctly  disconcerting, 
though  it  was  pretty  much  what  I  expected.  I  felt 
a  sort  of  meanness  in  getting  it — it  was  rather  like 
employing  a  private  detective  to  investigate  Alice's 
father.  But  my  question  to  Herridge  had  been  quite 
casual,  and  I  had  never  suspected  the  existence  of 
the  omniscient  Rogers.  As  for  his  information,  I  had 
no  doubt  it  was  correct.  The  date  of  19 13,  when 
Croxon  had  been  caught  on  the  cotton  market,  coin- 
cided with  what  Vernon  had  told  me  of  the  rapid 
decline  of  his  fortunes. 

I  pictured  him  to  myself  as  a  lean  wolfish  man, 
bright  and  alert,  bold  and  unscrupulous,  the  typical 
bandit  of  finance.  In  this  I  was  quite  wrong,  as  I 
discovered  a  day  later  when  I  saw  him  in  the  Wal- 
dorf. I  had  called  to  ascertain  if  Alice  had  arrived 
and  was  standing  by  the  desk  when  I  heard  a  voice 
behind  me  say,  "O  Misther  Croxon,  I'd  like  a  word 
with  you."  I  looked  round  and  saw  that  the  speaker 
was  an  undersized  bearded  man  of  unmistakably  Jew- 
ish blood.  He  had  laid  a  long  lean  hand  upon  the 
arm  of  a  big  man  who  towered  over  him  by  a  good 
foot  and  a  half,  whom  I  knew  to  be  Croxon.     He 


174  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

had  very  broad  shoulders,  a  solid  close-cropped  head, 
and  a  face  that  would  have  been  heavy  and  lifeless 
but  for  a  pair  of  remarkably  bright  and  shrewd  grey- 
blue  eyes.  The  first  impression,  created  chiefly  by 
his  great  bulk  and  prize-fighter's  head,  was  that  he 
was  a  very  formidable  person,  whose  path  it  would 
be  unsafe  to  cross.  The  impression,  however,  was 
corrected  by  the  mouth,  which  was  distinctly  humor- 
ous, and  a  kind  of  dancing  madness  in  the  eyes.  They 
were  shrewd  and  clear,  as  I  have  said,  but  they  had 
a  curious  visionary  quality,  a  glint  as  of  sun-bright 
ice, — the  eyes  of  a  man  accustomed  to  gaze  into 
blue  distances.  I  had  remarked  the  same  look  in  the 
eyes  of  men  who  lived  on  the  prairie,  and  I  had  also 
remarked  its  total  absence  in  city-dwellers. 

I  didn't  hear  what  his  Hebrew  friend  said  to  him, 
for  he  spoke  with  his  hand  to  his  mouth  in  a  hoarse 
whisper.  Croxon  appeared  to  be  listening  to  him 
with  good-natured  but  contemptuous  tolerance.  Pres- 
ently he  replied  in  a  booming  voice,  which,  neverthe- 
less, had  a  big-toned  suavity,  "Nothing  doing,  Isaacs." 
He  turned  on  his  heel  without  another  word,  and  came 
to  the  desk  for  his  key. 

At  this  point  the  clerk,  with  a  mistaken  notion  of 
doing  me  a  service,  said,  "This  gentleman  has  been 
enquiring  for  you,  Mr.  Croxon."  Croxon's  face  in, 
stantly  became  hard  and  suspicious.  He  gazed  at  m^. 
with  a  cold  curiosity,  appraising  my  appearance,  and 
probing  my  possible  motives  for  asking  for  him.  Ap- 
parently the  survey  was  not  unsatisfactory,  for  his 
mouth  relaxed  in  a  smile,  and  he  said  in  a  voice  as 


ALICE  CROXON  175 

soft  as  butter,  "I  am  pleased  to  meet  you,  sir.  Is 
it  on  business  you  wish  to  see  me?" 

"I'm  afraid  not,  Mr,  Croxon,"  I  replied.  "The  only 
claim  I  have  to  your  acquaintance  is  that  I  have  the 
pleasure  of  knowing  your  daughter." 

"My  daughter,"  he  cried  with  such  a  note  of  en- 
thusiastic pleasure  that  I  knew  instantaneously  and 
instinctively  that  his  whole  heart  was  bound  up  in 
Alice. 

"I  met  her  in  Fruitvale  last  summer,  when  she  was 
staying  with  my  friends,  the  Vernons." 

He  stretched  out  a  huge  hand,  and  held  mine  with 
a  grip  that  hurt. 

"Come  right  up  to  my  rooms,"  he  said.  "You  and 
I  should  have  a  good  deal  to  talk  about,  for  it's  months 
since  I  saw  my  daughter." 

I  went  up  to  his  rooms,  and  he  at  once  began  to 
ask  me  all  about  Alice.  He  listened  with  absorbed 
attention  while  I  spoke  of  the  life  at  Fruitvale. 

"Poor  little  girl,"  he  said.  "It  was  too  bad  to  send 
her  away.  But  I  had  to.  And  you  think  she  was 
really  happy  with  the  Vernons,  do  you?" 

"I  know  she  was.     She  loved  the  life." 

"What  did  she  do?     Tell  me." 

On  this  invitation  I  drew  a  quite  idyllic  picture  of 
life  at  Fruitvale,  and  was  touched  and  a  good  deal 
surprised  to  see  tears  in  his  eyes. 

"You  can't  think  how  lonely  I've  been  without  her," 
he  said  simply. 

And  then,  with  that  unsophisticated  frankness 
which  is  so  amiable  a  trait  in  the  American,  he  be- 


176  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

gaii  to  tell  me  details  about  his  personal  history,  which 
are  not  usually  revealed  except  between  intimates. 
He  had  lost  his  wife  years  before,  and  had  not  re- 
married. She  had  died  while  he  was  away  on  one 
of  his  land-hunting  trips.  The  news  came  to  him  in 
a  solitary  hut  beside  the  Peace  River.  "It  put  the  sun 
out  for  me,"  he  said.  "I  didn't  think  it  would  ever 
shine  again;  but  it  did  when  my  little  girl  began  to 
grow  up." 

We  were  interrupted  by  the  barking  of  a  dog.  He 
rose,  and  went  into  the  bath-room,  returning  with  a 
small  wicker-basket,  out  of  which  sprang  a  tiny  King 
Charles  spaniel. 

"She  was  very  fond  of  dogs,"  he  said  gravely.  "I 
used,  after  she  died,  to  carry  her  little  dog  round  with 
me  on  all  my  travels.  This  little  creature  is  in  the  di- 
rect descent  of  that  little  dog  my  wife  loved — a  kind  of 
great  grandchild,  aren't  you.  Flossy?  I  never  go  any- 
where without  her — sort  of  keeps  me  straight  to  have 
her  with  me.  We've  had  hard  times  together,  and 
we've  had  good  times,  but  we've  never  separated." 

He  spoke  with  a  wonderful  softness  and  wistful- 
ness.  I  thought  of  Rogers,  and  the  damaging  infor- 
mation recorded  in  his  files,  and  of  the  present  dubious 
business  of  the  man,  and  I  did  not  know  how  to  recon- 
cile these  things  with  this  elementary  tenderness  of 
nature. 

"You  must  go  now,"  he  said,  with  a  sudden  hard- 
ening in  his  voice.  "I've  a  business  engagement  for 
to-night,  which  I  must  keep.  But  come  again — let  us 
say  the  day  after  to-morrow — and  have  some  dinner 


ALICE  CROXON  177 

with  me.  I  expect  Alice  will  be  here,  and  no  doubt 
she'll  be  glad  to  see  you." 

He  looked  at  me  with  a  keen  appraising  glance. 

"You  aren't  interested  in  stocks,  are  you?" 

"No,  I'm  a  writer,  a  novelist." 

"That's  good,"  he  said  heartily.  "Forgive  my  ask- 
ing, but  you've  no  idea  how  I'm  bothered  by  men  who 
want  me  to  give  them  tips,  and  the  tricks  they  play 
on  me.  You  saw  me  talking  to  our  Hebrew  brother 
downstairs,  didn't  you  ?  He's  one  of  them.  He  posi- 
tively haunts  me.  I  wouldn't  wonder  if  he's  listen- 
ing at  the  key-hole  or  trying  to  hear  through  the  tran- 
som now." 

"These  are  the  penalties  of  being  a  millionaire,  I 
suppose,"  I  said  with  a  laugh. 

"Plenty  of  penalties  and  very  few  pleasures,"  he 
said  grimly.  "And  the  further  you  go  the  more  pen- 
alties and  the  fewer  pleasures." 

I  think  he  was  going  to  become  confidential  again, 
but  just  then  the  'phone  rang,  and  I  caught  snatches 
of  a  conversation  in  which  dollars  were  eagerly  dis- 
cussed. He  waved  his  hand  to  me,  and  I  knew  myself 
dismissed.  When  I  entered  the  foyer  the  "Hebrew 
brother"  was  still  prowling  up  and  down  like  an  un- 
quiet ghost.  He  bowed  to  me  obsequiously,  and 
would,  I  think,  have  spoken  to  me,  if  I  had  given 
him  the  opportunity.  I  perceived  that  I  had  gained 
great  prestige  in  his  eyes  by  having  been  closeted  with 
Croxon  for  an  hour,  and  the  respectful  glances  of 
the  desk-clerk  conveyed  the  same  impression.  If  they 
had  expressed  their  thoughts,  I  have  no  doubt  they 


178  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

would  have  credited  me  with  an  astute  financial  in- 
telligence of  which  I  was  totally  incapable;  and  if  I 
had  expressed  mine  they  would  have  been  surprised 
to  learn  that  I  was  not  thinking  of  Theodore  Croxon 
as  a  millionaire  at  all,  but  as  the  father  of  Alice. 


in 

Two  days  later  I  met  Alice. 

"She  only  arrived  this  morning,"  said  her  father, 
as  we  stood  waiting  for  her.  "Certainly  Fruitvale 
has  done  a  great  deal  for  her.  I  never  saw  her  look- 
ing so  well." 

The  door  opened  and  there  appeared  an  Alice  I 
had  never  seen.  I  had  seen  only  the  Alice  of  home- 
spun :  this  new  Alice  was  beautifully  gowned,  her  dark 
hair  fashionably  dressed,  a  string  of  pearls  round  her 
slender  throat.  She  moved  across  the  room  in  the 
confidence  of  her  young  beauty,  with  an  innocent 
haughtiness  of  carriage,  knowing  herself  worthy  of 
admiration ;  a  woman  to  be  remarked  among  a  throng, 
proud  and  sweet  and  desirable. 

"So  Gareth  has  come  at  last,"  she  said  with  a  smile. 
"And  Lynette  is  very  glad  to  see  him,  for  she's  had  no 
one  to  play  with  her  since  he  went." 

"Gareth?"  repeated  her  father.  "What's  that 
mean?" 

"Only  that  we  once  shared  a  camp  together,  father, 
and  learned  how  to  build  fires  and  wash  dishes." 

He  looked  mystified  and  curious. 


ALICE  CROXON  179 

"That  was  a  long  time  ago,"  she  remarked — and 
added  enigmatically,  "At  least  it  seems  so." 

We  went  down  to  dinner  in  the  crowded  dining- 
room.  A  table  had  been  reserved  against  a  window, 
from  which  we  could  watch  the  throngs  upon  the 
pavement,  and  the  lights  of  automobiles  flashing  up 
and  down,  like  fire-flies  in  the  evening  gloom. 

"New  York  at  last,"  she  said  with  a  happy  sigh.  "I 
didn't  know  I  loved  it  so  much  when  I  was  away  from 
it." 

"It's  the  only  place  worth  living  in,"  said  Croxon 
pontifically. 

"O  no,"  she  said,  "not  quite  that.  I  love  the  moun- 
tains too,  and  so  do  you,  father." 

"Yes,  of  course,"  he  made  ready  assent.  I  think 
he  would  have  assented  to  anything  she  said,  in  his 
gladness  at  having  her  with  him  again. 

"And  please,  I  am  so  hungry,"  she  said  with  that 
innocent  childish  greediness  which  I  had  found  so 
amusing  at  Fruitvale.  "You  can't  think  how  good 
New  York  food  looks  to  me  after  being  without  it 
so  long." 

"O  yes,  I  can,"  said  Croxon.  "I've  lived  on  bacon 
and  flap- jacks  for  weeks  together  in  the  woods.  I 
hope  the  Vernons  gave  you  something  better  than 
that  to  eat." 

"The  Vernons  are  perfectly  fine,  father.  They  gave 
me  the  very  best  they  had." 

"Of  course  they  did,"  said  Croxon.  "Any  one 
would.  I  must  do  something  for  the  Vernons.  You 
shall  tell  me  what  to  do." 


i8o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I'll  tell  you  the  best  thing  to  do,  father.  Send 
half-a-dozen  new  dresses  to  l^Irs.  Vernon.  Poor 
thing,  she  hasn't  seen  such  a  thing  for  years.  Let  me 
choose  them,  will  you?" 

She  turned  to  nic  and  said,  "It's  a  perfectly  lovely 
thing  to  have  a  rich  lather,  isn't  it?  See  what  he's 
given  me  this  afternoon."  She  pointed  to  the  neck- 
lace of  pearls.  "Isn't  it  beautiful?  And  didn't  he 
understand  me?" 

"What  did  he  understand?" 

"Something  that  many  wise  men  have  not  known, 
and  therefore  have  been  dreadfully  punished,"  she  said 
with  a  gay  laugh.  "The  solemn  truth,  my  unsophisti- 
cated Gareth,  that  the  woman  never  lived  who  couldn't 
be  made  happy  with  jewels  and  new  dresses." 

"I  thought  you'd  forgotten  all  these  vanities  at 
Fruitvalc." 

"About  as  much  as  you  forget  your  authorship, 
which  is  also  a  pleasant  form  of  vanity,  isn't  it?"  she 
retorted  with  a  little  gleam  of  humorous  malice. 

Croxon  listened  to  our  talk  with  a  surprised  air, 
but  with  evident  enjoyment.  I  suppose  he  hadn't 
formed  a  just  idea  of  our  relations;  he  hadn't  sus- 
pected their  intimacy.  But  he  was  not  displeased; 
I  noted  that.  He  hung  upon  his  daughter's  words, 
with  a  pathetic  eagerness.  He  nodded  his  head 
gravely,  his  lips  smiled,  and  in  his  keen  eyes  I  read 
the  comment,  "Isn't  she  clever?"  Of  course  I  was 
only  the  foil  to  that  cleverness.  If  he  had  spoken  his 
thought  I  am  sure  he  would  have  said,  "You  may  con- 
sider yourself  a  very  fortunate  young  man  to  furnish 


ALICE  CROXON  i8i 

the  provocation  for  my  daughter's  brilliancy,"  and 
certainly  I  would  not  have  disputed  the  justness  of  his 
estimate. 

The  dinner  passed  ofif  delightfully.  Our  talk  was 
mostly  about  Fruitvale,  its  men  and  women,  its  scen- 
ery, its  charm  of  climate  and  situation,  with  much 
intimate  gossip  about  the  doings  of  the  little  settle- 
ment. 

"If  the  place  is  all  you  say  it  is,  I  must  build  a 
house  there,"  said  Croxon. 

"O  no,  that  wouldn't  do  at  all,  father.  You'd  want 
to  build  an  Adirondack  cottage,  which  means 

'A  cottage,  with  a  double  coach-house. 
The  pride  that  apes  humility.' 

And  that  would  corrupt  the  settlement  by  making 
every  one  else  envious  and  discontented." 

"Well,  we'll  build  a  genuine  cottage  then,  and  spend 
next  summer  there.     How's  that?" 

"That  wouldn't  do  for  me,  I'm  afraid,  father.  I 
want  you  to  take  me  to  Paris.  You  know,  I  was  to 
have  gone  last  October,  and  didn't  go  on  account  of 
this  wretched  war." 

"And  you  can't  go  now,  Alice.  Paris  isn't  any 
longer  the  Paris  you  love.     It's  dead." 

"But  you  are  going  there  soon.  You  told  me  you 
were,  father." 

"That's  a  different  matter.  I  have  to  go  on  busi- 
ness sometime  toward  the  beginning  of  May." 

"Well,  the  war  will  be  all  over  by  that  time.    Every- 


1 82  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

body  says  so.  And  we'll  get  there  in  time  to  see  the 
peace  celebrations.     That'll  be  delightful." 

lie  smiled  tolerantly,  and  said,  "Well,  we'll  see." 
Rut  the  look  in  his  eyes  contradicted  the  smile  on  his 
lips.  I  remembered  what  Rogers  had  reported  about 
his  contracts  for  boots  for  the  French  army,  and  his 
activity  in  the  steel  market.  I  had  forgotten  it.  I  had 
been  conscious  only  of  his  pride  and  his  affection,  the 
tenderness  and  human  quality  of  the  man.  The  cold 
ice-blue  glitter  in  his  eyes  reminded  me  of  Croxon  the 
speculator,  who  had  a  direct  interest  in  prolonging 
the  war. 

An  inconsiderate  impulse  moved  me  to  question  him 
about  it,  to  ask  his  opinion  on  the  chances  of  an  early 
peace. 

"Buy  steel,"  was  his  curt  reply, 

"But  I  don't  want  to  buy  steel,  Mr.  Croxon.  I 
haven't  the  least  idea  of  making  money  out  of  this 
war." 

It  was  an  unfortunate  remark,  for  it  am.ounted  to 
an  accusation. 

"Why  not?"  he  answered.  "Some  one  has  to  make 
money  out  of  every  war.  It  can't  be  helped.  War's 
a  vast  business,  and  there  are  profits  in  it  for  the 
man  who  knows  how  to  make  them." 

"America's  making  them.  I  know  that.  She's  mak- 
ing them  because  she's  protected  by  the  British  Navy. 
It  doesn't  strike  me  as  a  very  worthy  occupation." 

"And  we're  feeding  Britain,  and  supplying  her  with 
ammunition — don't  forget  that.  She  ought  to  be  very 
much  obliged  to  us." 


ALICE  CROXON  183 

"And  getting  rich  in  the  process,"  I  retorted. 

"And  Where's  the  harm  in  that?  I  never  met  a 
man  yet  who  wouldn't  be  rich  if  he  knew  how.  If 
a  man  is  poor,  you  may  be  sure  it  isn't  because  he  loves 
poverty.  I've  been  poor,  and  I  know.  And  I've 
known  lots  of  men  who  professed  it  was  a  very  peril- 
ous thing  to  be  rich,  but  the  moment  I  offered  them 
the  chance  of  making  money  they  experienced  a  sud- 
den change  of  heart,  and  were  perfectly  ready  to  take 
the  risk.  And  I'll  tell  you  another  thing;  I  know 
some  vociferous  pacifists  who  are  putting  all  their 
dollars  into  munitions.  They  love  peace,  but  they're 
not  above  making  a  profit  out  of  war,  if  they  can. 
It's  very  like  your  clergymen  in  England  of  whom  I've 
read,  who  denounce  the  drink  traffic  from  their  pul- 
pits and  invest  their  savings  in  brewery  shares.  Hu- 
man nature's  a  queer  compound,  I  admit;  but  there's 
one  thing  about  it  you  may  be  absolutely  sure  of — at 
the  bottom  of  every  man's  motives  you'll  find  the  dol- 
lars, sir." 

He  had  talked  himself  into  a  good  humour,  and  he 
made  me  conscious  that  ill-humour  on  my  part  was  a 
gross  social  error,  since  I  was  his  guest. 

Alice  appeared  to  be  delighted  with  the  controversy. 

"I  do  love  to  hear  men  quarrel,"  she  said,  "and  it's 
so  long  since  I  heard  a  really  ferocious  argument. 
The  men  at  Fruitvale  don't  quarrel — they're  too  tame. 
They're  incapable  of  agitation." 

"I'm  sure  I  wasn't  quarrelling,"  I  protested. 

"O  yes,  you  were.  You  were  pushing  your  fingers 
through  your  hair — that's  a  sure  sign.     I've  seen  you 


1 84  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

do  it  l)€fore.  And  father's  face  is  quite  red.  Don't 
deny  it,  either  of  you.  You've  only  to  look  in  the 
glass,  and  you'll  see  that  I'm  right." 

"I  suppose  you  agree  with  your  father?"  I  said  un- 
graciously. 

"Of  course  I  do.  I  always  told  you  I  was  a  very 
worldly  person,  didn't  I,  though  you  would  never 
believe  it.  And  besides,  when  your  father's  just  given 
you  a  pearl  necklace  costing  goodness  knows  how 
much,  you  couldn't  expect  me  to  disagree  with  his 
ideas  of  earning  money,  could  you?" 

We  rose  from  the  table  and  went  out  into  the 
crowded  foyer.  As  usual,  there  were  men  waiting 
for  Croxon,  and  one  touched  his  elbow,  and  drew  him 
aside  in  a  whispered  conversation.  Alice  laid  her  hand 
upon  my  arm. 

"I  had  to  keep  you  from  quarrelling  with  father, 
hadn't  I,  Gareth?  li  I  hadn't,  and  he'd  become  really 
angry,  he'd  have  ordered  you  off,  and  then  I  shouldn't 
have  seen  you  again,  should  I?" 

"You  are  really  glad  to  see  me,  then?" 

"Of  course  I  am.  There's  so  much  I  want  to  talk 
about.     I'm  really  in  great  trouble." 

"Trouble,  Alice  ?    What  about  ?" 

"Things  in  general.  The  war  chiefly.  It's  break- 
ing up  everything.  Vernon  is  going  to  leave  his  wife 
and  enlist.  And  I  didn't  tell  you,  did  I — poor  Alan 
Joddrel's  dead." 

"Then  my  dream  was  true!"  I  cried. 

"What  dream?" 


ALICE  CROXON  185 

"I  dreamed  a  month  ago  that  he  came  to  me  with 
a  great  red  wound  in  his  back." 

"That  was  about  the  time  he  died,"  she  said.  She 
gazed  at  me  with  eyes  distended,  and  a  pale  face.  Un- 
der the  ghttering  Hghts  of  the  crowded  foyer,  the 
shadow  of  death  passed,  Hke  a  waft  of  cold  air. 

"Let  us  sit  down,"  she  said.  "I'm  afraid  I  don't 
understand.  What  do  you  mean  by  saying  you 
dreamed  Alan  Joddrel  was  killed?" 

We  found  a  quiet  corner,  and  I  told  her  my  singu- 
lar vision  of  Mrs.  Joddrel  and  her  boy  coming  up  the 
ranch-path,  and  Alan  following  them  like  a  wraith. 

"That's  more  than  curious,"  she  said,  "for,  do  you 
know,  something  like  that  did  really  happen.  Mrs. 
Joddrel  and  her  little  boy  did  come  to  Fruitvale.  She 
expected  to  find  you  there,  for  she  did  not  know  you 
had  returned  to  New  York.  At  the  store  they  directed 
her  to  come  to  the  Vernons.  And  she  was  exactly 
as  you  describe  her,  a  little  woman  in  shabby  black, 
and  her  boy  had  a  soldier's  hat  and  a  red  jacket. 
Gareth,  what's  the  matter  with  the  world?  What's 
happening  ?  There's  something  uncanny  about  it.  I'm 
frightened." 

"Why  should  you  be  frightened,  Alice?" 

"I  don't  know,  but  I  am.  It  began  that  night  when 
we  saw  the  Northern  lights  at  the  old  mine.  Do 
you  remember  what  the  old  lame  man  said,  that  they 
were  an  omen  of  something  big  and  dreadful?  It's 
like  living  in  a  house  where  everything  seems  solid, 
but  it  isn't.     It's  as  though  the  walls  kept  getting 


1 86  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

thinner,  till  they  were  transparent — you  haven't  any 
shelter — it's  Hke  God  breaking  through." 

"Why,  Alice "  I  protested. 

"No,  let  me  speak,  please.  I  can't  tell  father  what 
I  feel,  for  he  wouldn't  understand.  And  I  couldn't 
tell  the  Vernons,  for  the  same  reason.  But  you  will 
understand.  I'm  gay,  and  bright,  and  cheerful,  and 
I'm  truly  worldly — I  always  told  you  that.  But  I've 
a  feeling  very  often  that  nothing  I  touch  is  real. 
Something's  happening  to  the  world  that  isn't  ra- 
tional; it  isn't  human  and  comprehensible.  It's  like 
a  great  ship  that's  turned  turtle;  all  the  big  familiar 
rooms  are  filled  with  black  water,  and  we're  just 
scrambling  up  the  keel,  and  clinging  there.  The 
world's  gone  topsy-turvy.  God's  hand  has  pushed  it 
over.  I  thrust  the  thought  away  from  me,  but  it 
always  comes  back.     I  can't  see  what  God  wants  to 

do  it   for.     We  were  all   so  happy,   and  now . 

There's  Vernon  going  to  enlist,  and  poor  little  Mrs. 
Vernon  pretends  she's  proud  of  him.  But  I've  heard 
her  crying  in  the  night.  And  there's  that  poor  little 
Mrs.  Joddrel — she  looked  like  a  child  stupefied  by 
unkindness.  And  one  night,  after  you  left,  we  saw 
those  lights  again — they  came  walking  over  the  hills 
like  white  ghosts,  whispering  together,  and  planning 
mischief.    O,  there's  no  doubt  of  it,  I'm  frightened !" 

It  was  a  strange  confession  to  be  made  in  that  bril- 
liant foyer,  thronged  with  men  full  of  meat  and 
women  glittering  with  diamonds.  My  eyes  turned  in- 
stinctively to  the  vision  of  a  world,  palpable  and  real, 


ALICE  CROXON  187 

where  no  one  had  the  least  sense  of  God  breaking 
through,  as  AHce  had  put  it. 

She  read  my  thought,  and  said,  "I  know  everything 
looks  real.  And  to-morrow,  no  doubt,  I  shall  believe 
it's  real.  I'm  going  to  have  a  good  time  in  New  York, 
never  fear.  I'm  going  to  let  my  worldliness  have 
full  fling,  and  perhaps  I  shall  end  by  being  just  what 
these  women  are." 

"You  couldn't,"  I  said. 

"Why  not?  They're  what  they  are  because  they 
have  wealth.  Father  tells  me  he's  got  more  money 
than  he  ever  had,  and  so  you  see  my  fate's  fixed." 

There  was  a  bitterness  in  her  voice,  a  cruel  jarring 
note  of   irony. 

"Well,  that's  enough,"  she  said,  with  a  swift  return 
to  her  usual  lightness  of  speech.  "I've  rid  myself  of 
the  perilous  stuff,  and  already  I  feel  much  better. 
After  all,  I  don't  suppose  God  troubles  Himself  very 
much  over  any  of  us — there  are  too  many  of  us.  I 
think  I've  lived  too  long  among  the  mountains.  They 
can  be  very  grim  by  the  end  of  November,  I  assure 
you,  and  they've  depressed  me.  Forget  my  silly  con- 
fidences, Gareth,  and  help  me  to  have  a  good  time. 
If  you  don't,  I'll  never  forgive  you." 

We  saw  Croxon  making  his  way  toward  us  through 
the  gay  throng. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "what  have  you  two  been  talk- 
ing about?" 

"A  little  of  the  pleasures  of  memory,  and  a  good 
deal  more  of  the  pleasures  of  anticipation,"  said  Alice. 


i88  THE  WAR  EAGLE' 

"Fathcr.  we  want  you  to  take  us  to  the  Opera  to-mor- 
row night.    It's  A'ida,  and  I'd  love  to  hear  it  again." 

"Why  certainly,"  he  replied;  "I  believe  I'm  a  sub- 
scriber; but  I  haven't  cared  to  go  alone.  I've  waited 
for  my  little  girl  to  go  with  me.  And  I'm  sure  I  shall 
be  delighted  for  Mr.  Waller  to  come  with  us." 

"To-morrow  night,  then,"  said  Alice.  "And  now, 
if  you'll  excuse  me,  I'll  go  to  bed.  I  had  almost  for- 
gotten that  I've  had  five  nights  in  the  train,  the  last 
on  the  bumpiest  railway  in  the  world,  and  I'm  really 
tired." 


IV 

We  went  to  the  Opera,  and  the  next  night  to  a  play ; 
and  after  that  to  many  plays.  Croxon  appeared  sat- 
isfied to  leave  Alice  in  my  care,  and  to  be  rather  glad 
than  otherwise  that  he  could  count  on  me  as  an  escort 
for  her.  He  was  obviously  too  busy  for  such  a  duty. 
He  was  always  driving  about  New  York,  from  office 
to  office,  coming  home  at  night  indisposed  for  pleas- 
ure, and  often  spending  long  hours  in  his  rooms  over 
plans  and  papers,  or  in  interviewing  persons  of  im- 
portance to  him  in  his  schemes.  We  would  come  back 
from  the  theatre  to  find  him  elbow  deep  in  legal 
agreements,  writing  furiously,  or  looking  up  with  tired 
eyes  to  greet  us.  It  didn't  seem  much  fun  to  be  a 
millionaire.  He  worked  harder  than  a  dozen  clerks, 
was  overdriven  and  weary,  and  had  no  time  for  pleas- 
ure. But  there  was  no  doubt  that  he  found  a  kind 
of  fierce  enjoyment  in  his  task,  in  its  antagonisms  and 


ALICE  CROXON  189 

its  conquests,  perhaps  in  its  very  chances  and  perils. 

He  left  me  uncertain  of  what  he  thought  of  me. 
In  his  brusque  way  he  liked  me;  at  all  events  he  was 
never  unfriendly.  I  was  free  to  come  and  go  as  I 
willed ;  he  took  me  for  granted.  Alice  found  me  serv- 
iceable, and  that  was  enough  for  him.  It  was  evident 
that  he  had  perfect  faith  in  the  discretion  of  his  daugh- 
ter, and  was  glad  to  allow  her  the  most  complete 
liberty  of  action.  He  had,  I  suppose,  a  kind  of  faith 
in  me  too,  that  I  was  not  likely  to  abuse  the  privileges 
accorded  me.  He  must  have  suspected  that  I  was  in 
love  with  Alice,  but  he  gave  me  no  sign  of  whether 
he  regarded  such  a  temper  on  my  part  with  favour  or 
disfavour. 

It  seemed  that  Alice  had  no  woman  friends  in  New 
York.  She  and  her  father  had  lived  almost  entirely 
in  hotels.  Their  only  real  home  was  left  when  Mrs. 
Croxon  died,  many  years  before;  it  was  a  plain  clap- 
boarded  house  in  a  Western  town.  Croxon  showed 
me  a  faded  photograph  of  it  once,  with  Alice,  a  little 
girl  in  short  frocks,  standing  on  the  wooden  steps. 
When  her  mother  died,  she  had  been  sent  to  friends 
in  Chicago,  and  then  to  a  private  school  upon  the 
Hudson.  Croxon,  who  at  the  time  was  engaged  in 
the  lumber-business,  had  resumed  his  wandering  life 
as  prospector  and  speculator,  travelling  far  and  wide 
to  examine  mining  properties  or  acquire  sections  of 
forest-land.  He  would  appear  at  long  intervals  at  the 
school,  take  his  daughter  out  for  a  day's  pleasure,  and 
disappear  again  in  meteoric  fashion.  And  because 
the  girl  had  no  home  to  which  she  might  invite  her 


I90  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

school-mates,  she  made  few  friends  and  left  the  school 
as  solitary  as  she  had  entered  it. 

It  was  a  comfortless,  unhomely  life,  which  pro- 
duced independence  of  character,  but  little  else  that 
was  worth  having.  When  Croxon  made  his  first  for- 
tune by  speculation,  he  realised  that  he  had  not  been 
quite  just  to  Alice,  and  he  sought  to  make  her  amends 
by  purchasing  a  house  and  establishing  himself  in 
New  York.  It  was  to  this  house  that  Mrs.  Vernon 
came  as  governess,  and  she  was  the  first  woman  with 
whom  Alice  had  ever  known  a  contact  that  was  in- 
timate and  affectionate.  But  even  as  a  householder, 
Croxon  made  no  friends  who  were  congenial  to  a 
young  girl.  Men  came  to  the  house  constantly,  and 
in  numbers;  eager  nervous  men  with  predatory  eyes, 
fixed  on  the  illusion  of  wealth;  indifferent  to  the  finer 
apparition  of  youth  that  glided  sometimes  through  the 
sumptuous  rooms,  silent  and  a  little  scornful.  When 
the  crash  came  the  house  was  sold,  and  father  and 
daughter  went  to  a  second-rate  hotel  within  a  hun- 
dred yards  of  the  inaccessible  splendours  of  the  Wal- 
dorf. Croxon  had  sense  enough  to  perceive  that  this 
was  no  place  for  Alice,  and  had  the  wisdom  to  send 
her  off  to  the  Vernons  at  Fruitvale.  Since  then  he 
had  known  various  vicissitudes,  from  which  he  had 
at  last  emerged  triumphant;  but  by  this  time  he  was 
inured  to  hotel  life,  and  had  lost  the  desire  for  any- 
thing else.  If  he  had  told  the  truth,  he  would  have 
said  he  greatly  preferred  the  thronged  halls  and  pas- 
sages of  the  Waldorf,  the  sense  of  stir  and  variety, 
the  evasion  of  household   responsibilities,   the  entire 


ALICE  CROXON  191 

liberty  of  his  life,  to  anything  he  might  have  attained 
by  living  in  a  house  of  dressed  stone  in  the  pompous 
solitude  of  Upper  Fifth  Avenue. 

I  learned  these  facts  incidentally.  Sometimes  Alice 
opened  a  shuttered  window,  and  gave  me  a  brief 
glimpse  of  her  past. 

"I  don't  like  women,"  she  said  once.  "They're  all 
right  with  men,  but  they  can  be  mighty  mean  to  one 
another."  When  I  expressed  surprise,  she  said, 
''You've  never  lived  in  a  girl's  boarding  school.  I 
have,  and  believe  me  there's  no  place  on  earth  where 
there's  more  petty  cruelty.  You  men  only  see  the 
dear  creatures  in  white  dresses,  moving  across  the 
campus  like  vestal  virgins  going  to  a  shrine,  and  you 
think  how  tender  and  sweet  and  gracious  they  look. 
You  should  hear  them  talk  in  their  bedrooms.  And 
you  should  see  how  they  behave  to  a  girl  they  don't 
understand,  or  whose  social  position  is  enigmatic." 

"Were  you  unhappy  at  school,  Alice?" 

"Of  course  I  was.  I  didn't  have  friends  to  visit 
me  like  the  others,  and  that  set  their  tongues  wag- 
ging. I  knew  they  invented  all  sorts  of  legends  about 
me,  none  of  them  to  my  credit.  And  when  father 
did  come  to  see  me,  they  sniggered,  as  though  they 
didn't  believe  he  was  really  my  father. 

"I  did  make  one  friend,  or  thought  I  did;  she  was 
the  girl  I  expected  to  go  to  Paris  with.  I  never  knew 
why  she  ceased  writing  to  me  all  at  once,  but  I  know 
now.  She  had  no  doubt  heard  something  about  fa- 
ther's business  troubles,  which  he  concealed  from  me, 
and  of  course  she  dropped  me." 


192  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"If  that  was  the  kind  of  girl  she  was,  she  couldn't 
have  been  any  great  loss." 

"O  yes,  she  was.  She  was  the  only  friend  I'd  ever 
had.  I  wasted  what  poets  call  'the  treasures  of  my 
heart'  upon  her.  Really  and  truly  I  did  admire  her, 
with  that  romantic  love  a  young  girl  has  for  another 
girl  just  a  little  older  and  wiser  than  herself.  I  can 
remember  lying  awake  at  night  and  inventing  all  kinds 
of  dramas  about  the  things  I  'would  do  for  her,  how 
if  she  were  drowning  I  would  save  her  and  die  in 
doing  it,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing.  I  would  have  done 
it,  too.  I  would  have  jumped  at  the  chance  of  being 
sacrificed  for  her.    Wasn't  I  a  little  fool  ?" 

"I  can  remember  something  of  the  kind  myself," 
I  said.  "Boys  have  the  same  kind  of  attachments. 
I  once  had  a  friend  I'd  have  walked  all  over  London 
to  meet  for  a  single  hour,  and  he  came  and  stayed 
in  a  house  in  the  next  street  from  mine  and  never 
came  to  see  me." 

"That's  not  the  same  thing,  Gareth.  Men  know 
how  to  live  with  themselves.  Women  rarely  do.  Look 
at  my  father.  I  know  he  loves  me  dearly,  but  he  can 
get  on  quite  well  without  me.  I'm  not  really  neces- 
sary to  him.  Nine-tenths  of  his  thoughts  are  in  his 
business.  Now  and  again  he  gives  the  other  tenth 
a  chance,  and  then  he's  the  most  delightful  father 
on  earth.  Do  you  know  what  I've  thought  of  doing? 
I've  thought  of  learning  type-writing,  so  that  I  may 
be  his  secretary.  I  should  see  so  much  more  of  him 
as  his  typist  than  his  daughter." 

From  this  and  similar  confessions  I  built  up  an 


ALICE  CROXON  193 

appealing  picture  of  lonely  childhood  and  unfriended 
youth.  I  saw  Alice,  a  tiny  human  atom,  drifting  on 
the  tide  of  circumstance,  ignorant  of  the  sweet  so- 
cialities which  soften  and  develop  character,  left  to 
grope  her  way  unaided  through  the  maze  of  the  emo- 
tions. I  began  to  understand  her  discontent,  the  bit- 
terness that  penetrated  her  sweetness,  the  "worldliness" 
of  which  she  made  such  pathetic  boast,  which  was 
really  nothing  more  than  a  passionate  resolve  to  get 
the  most  out  of  a  world  which  had  given  her  little 
and  had  little  to  give  which  she  really  valued.  And 
I  began  to  understand  Croxon,  too.  He  was  a  man 
incapable  of  deliberate  unkindness.  I  pictured  him 
sitting  solitary  in  some  rough  mining  camp,  with  his 
dead  wife's  little  dog  upon  his  knees,  feeding  the  tiny 
creature  with  assiduous  hands,  cherishing  it  as  the 
living  link  with  a  past  that  held  all  the  real  happi- 
ness he  had  ever  known.  He  sat,  with  the  setting  sun 
at  his  feet,  emotionally  meditative,  until  some  dull  ex- 
plosion in  the  rocks  above  his  head  roused  him,  and 
he  rose,  with  ice-blue  eyes  hard  and  clear,  to  seek  the 
fortune  that  evaded  him.  It  was  not  a  lofty  battle, 
and  he  knew  it.  He  had  wistful  penetrating  hours 
of  vision  when  he  felt  its  sordidness.  Money  won  or 
money  lost  was  of  little  consequence  to  him  because 
he  was  aware  of  a  better  wealth  which  life  denied 
him.  He  was  simply  a  man  caught  in  the  mesh  of 
Mammon,  unable  to  extricate  himself,  unwilling  for 
the  most  part,  tensely  eager  to  win  his  game  for  the 
game's  sake  rather  than  its  prize;  a  man  who  could 
be  unscrupulous,  unmerciful  to  rivals,  perhaps  dishon- 


194  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

est,  but  in  his  heart  of  hearts  kept  an  unspoiled  ten- 
derness of  nature,  Hke  a  sweet  well  hidden  under  a 
rank  growth  of  thorn  and  poisonous  weeds. 

In  his  rare  moments  of  expansiveness  he  let  me 
see  his  heart. 

"I  think."  he  said  once,  "I'm  the  biggest  fool  alive. 
I've  got  all  the  money  I  want,  but  beyond  knowing 
that  I've  got  it,  I  don't  see  that  I'm  a  bit  better  off." 

"Why  go  on  struggling  to  get  more,  then?"  I 
asked. 

"Don't  know.  That's  where  I'm  a  fool.  I  suppose 
it's  just  to  keep  the  other  fellow  from  getting  it.  And 
then  there's  Alice — I  tell  myself  I'm  making  it  for 
her." 

He  sat  silent  a  moment,  and  then  said  in  an  in- 
expressibly soft  voice,  "If  it  wasn't  for  her,  I  guess 
I'd  pull  out  and  get  a  farm  somewhere  and  live  on  it. 
Did  I  ever  tell  you  I  was  brought  up  on  a  farm? 
Well,  I  was.  I  kind  of  see  myself  a  ragged  little 
barefoot  lad  running  about  that  farm.  There  was 
a  swimming  pool  where  I  spent  whole  days,  diving  and 
lying  on  the  grass  in  the  sun  to  get  dry.  I  guess  I 
was  really  happy  in  those  days.  Father  beat  me 
now  and  then,  but  I  didn't  mind  that  because  mother 
always  consoled  me  afterwards  with  dough-nuts. 
Those  dough-nuts  were  worth  the  beatings.  If  I  could 
taste  those  dough-nuts  again  I  think  I'd  be  happy.  I 
don't  see  what  men  want  to  live  for  anyway.  I  can't 
see  how  they  make  out  it's  worth  while.  If  I  could 
be  back  on  that  farm,  and  go  swimming  and  eat  moth- 
er's dough-nuts,  I  don't  say  I  wouldn't  want  to  live. 


ALICE  CROXON  195 

I  try  to  kid  myself  I'm  having  a  good  time,  and  I 
wish  mother  could  see  me — she'd  be  surprised, 
wouldn't  she?  She  turned  a  dollar  bill  ten  ways  be- 
fore she  spent  it,  and  passed  most  of  her  life  trying 
to  persuade  herself  that  two  and  two  made  five.  But 
I  guess  she  was  happier  than  I  am,  and  maybe  if  I 
could  see  her  coming  in  at  that  door  with  a  pile  of 
fresh  dough-nuts,  all  crisp  and  brown  from  the  pan, 
I'd  be  happy  tool" 

It  was  a  singular  confession,  but  it  was  character- 
istic of  the  man.  It  was  equally  characteristic  that 
a  call  upon  the  'phone  from  some  business  associate, 
or  the  delivery  of  a  telegram  (he  received  scores 
every  day)  instantly  changed  him  from  a  wistful 
dreamer  into  a  person  alert,  predatory,  formidable, 
armed  for  contest,  athirst  for  victory  on  the  battle- 
fields of  Mammon.  I  believe  he  would  have  cheated 
me  without  compunction  and  from  mere  habit  if  I 
had  had  any  money  to  invest.  His  liking  for  me,  his 
confidence  in  me,  arose  very  largely  from  the  fact 
that  I  stood  altogether  outside  his  world.  It  is  cer- 
tain that  he  would  not  have  trusted  Alice  with  any 
one  of  his  business  friends.  Among  those  friends 
were  several  youngish  men,  well-dressed  and  well- 
mannered,  but  his  attitude  toward  them  was  so  hostile 
that  not  one  of  them  would  have  dared  to  let  his 
eyes  rest  on  Alice.  I  suppose  he  knew  them  too  well 
to  trust  them,  knew  very  likely  private  details  of 
their  lives  which  made  them  untrustworthy. 

He  knew  me  only  as  a  friend  of  Alice,  and  her 
liking  for  me  was  for  him  the  guarantee  of  my  char- 


196  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

acter.  lie  acccplcHl  nic  from  the  first  with  a  gener- 
ous simplicity,  as  her  friend.  I  was  free  to  meet  her 
when  I  would,  and  he  was  pleased  that  I  should  give 
her  what  he  called  "a  good  time."  Now  and  then  he 
would  go  to  the  play  or  opera  with  us,  but  he  was 
not  interested  in  them,  and  was  always  uneasy  to  get 
back  to  his  desk.  It  should  be  added  that  he  could 
never  be  persuaded  that  what  I  called  my  work  was 
in  any  real  sense  work  at  all.  He  seemed  to  think 
that  the  writing  of  books  was  a  pastime,  not  an  occu- 
pation. 

"I  guess  I'm  a  considerable  writer,  too,"  he  once 
said  jocularly,  pointing  to  the  immense  correspond- 
ence on  his  table;  and  I  knew  that  it  was  useless  to 
explain  that  there  was  a  vital  difference  between  the 
products  of  his  pen  and  the  results  of  mine. 

His  ignorance  in  this  respect  was  too  naive  to  hurt 
my  vanity.  He  would  have  treated  Shakespeare  with 
the  same  good-humoured  misunderstanding.  It  was 
enough  for  me  that  he  allowed  me  unrestricted  com- 
panionship with  Alice,  and  I  was  only  too  happy  to 
take  advantage  of  my  opportunities.  Even  to  me,  in 
these  days,  the  writing  of  books  had  become  a  mat- 
ter of  quite  insignificant  importance  compared  with 
the  strong  lure  of  love  that  drew  my  will  and  blood 
toward   Alice   Croxon. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  LURE 


The  winter  was  slowly  capitulating  to  the  spring. 
There  were  hard  clear  days  of  sunlight  with  blowing 
winds,  when  the  sky  was  a  pure  dome  of  blue,  crys- 
talline and  immaculate.  There  were  golden  after- 
noons, when  soft  gusts  of  air  breathed  through  the 
canyons  of  the  city,  and  starry  nights  when  a  great 
stillness  lay  upon  the  earth.  The  blood  moved  more 
quickly  in  the  veins,  the  lungs  drew  a  deeper  breathy 
and  the  mind  became  more  hopeful.  The  thought  of 
resurrection,  parent  of  so  many  beautiful  analogies 
through  which  man  interprets  his  mysterious  destiny, 
took  possession  of  the  heart,  filling  it  with  living 
warmth,  stirring  it  with  unspoken  expectations. 

I  had  all  but  completed  my  book,  and  I  knew  what 
lay  beyond  it.  I  had  made  a  promise  to  myself  and 
given  a  bond  for  my  own  honour. 

If  I  was  tempted  to  forget  that  obligation,  I  could 
not  do  so,  with  the  eyes  of  Mary  Lorimer  upon  me. 
Since  the  night  of  our  conversation  on  the  verandah 
I  had  shunned  contact  with  her,  and  she  with  me. 
But  we  were  nevertheless  acutely  conscious  of  each 
other's  presence.    What  she  thought  of  me  I  could  not 

197 


198  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

guess,  but  in  her  eyes  I  surprised  more  than  once  a 
look  of  regard,  and  of  something  warmer  than  re- 
gard, to  which  I  could  give  no  response.  In  my 
thoughts  of  her,  pity  and  hostility  were  unequally 
divided.  I  was  sorry  for  her,  but  I  was  aware  of  a 
sort  of  dominance  which  she  wished  to  exercise  over 
my  mind,  and  this  I  resented. 

She  knew  I  was  in  love.  One  cannot  live  beneath 
the  scrutiny  of  a  woman's  eyes  and  conceal  entirely 
from  her  one's  private  emotions.  There  is  a  natural 
witchcraft  in  woman,  unscrupulous  and  subtle,  by 
which  she  discovers  the  secret  of  a  man's  heart.  She 
had  never  seen  Alice,  I  had  never  spoken  of  her,  but 
she  knew  that  I  was  in  love.  There  were  times  when 
I  read  in  her  eyes  a  contempt  of  me,  a  scorn  of  what 
she  deemed  a  weakness;  and  sometimes  I  saw  there 
a  rapid  flash  of  fire  that  suggested  jealousy.  I  was  not 
careful  to  discriminate  her  feelings;  but  I  feared  their 
expression,  and  therefore  held  aloof  from  her.  I 
wrote  each  morning,  but  every  afternoon  found  me 
in  New  York.  After  a  while  I  found  it  convenient 
to  spend  the  night  in  New  York  two  or  three  times 
a  week,  so  that  I  became  a  very  casual  lodger  in  the 
house  at  Oakwood. 

These  spring  days  in  New  York,  how  shall  I  de- 
scribe them!  I  seemed  to  be  afloat  upon  a  tide  of 
happiness.  All  things  went  well  with  me,  miracu- 
lously well.  My  story  was  attracting  attention  in  the 
magazine,  and  winning  praise  from  men  whose  praise 
was  worth  having,  fellow-artists  who  measured  its 
faults  and  excellencies  with  skilled  judgment  and  com- 


THE  LURE  199 

prehending  sympathy.  Even  Herridge  was  satisfied, 
reluctantly  confessing  that  perhaps  after  all  I  knew 
more  of  my  art  than  he  did.  Henry  Trafiford,  too, 
was  pleased. 

"You're  painting  with  a  broader  brush,"  he  said. 
"The  fault  of  your  early  work  was  too  much  stip- 
pling, the  conscious  effort  to  be  fine.  You're  writing 
now  in  a  sense  more  carelessly,  but  it  is  the  careless- 
ness of  strength.  You've  got  more  to  say,  and  are 
saying  it  better,  because  the  message  is  more  to  you 
than  the  form." 

He  had  never  recurred  to  that  more  intimate  note 
struck  in  our  conversation  in  September.  He  often 
talked  of  the  war,  but  it  was  usually  of  its  wider 
public  aspects,  not  its  personal.  Herridge  rarely  men- 
tioned it.  He  had  apparently  accepted  it  as  a  normal 
thing.  He  planned  his  life  as  if  it  never  existed.  He 
talked  of  going  over  to  England  in  the  late  spring, 
in  search  of  new  writers  for  his  magazine.  It  was 
his  custom  to  visit  London  once  a  year,  and  he  saw 
no  reason  why  he  should  not  go. 

"The  war's  episodic,  after  all,"  he  said.  "Men's 
lives,  in  the  main,  go  on  just  the  same.  It's  like  a  fire 
a  dozen  streets  away — you  look  at  it  from  your  top 
windows,  and  then  go  down  to  dinner  as  usual.  As 
long  as  it's  not  in  your  street,  why  should  you  worry?" 

In  contact  with  these  men,  so  much  older  and  more 
experienced  than  myself,  my  own  inner  agitation  was 
assuaged.  They  represented  the  fundamental  good 
sense  of  the  world.  They  made  me  feel  that  the 
atmosphere  of   the  Lorimer  house  was  hysteric.     I 


200  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

must  guard  against  hysteria — the  hot  rush  of  impulse 
that  betrayed  one  into  foolish  decisions!  Herridge 
might  be  coldly  self-centred,  but  certainly  Trafford 
was  not.  He  had  read  the  real  meaning  of  the  war 
from  the  first,  and  had  foreseen  the  ultimate  sacri- 
fice it  would  impose  upon  us  all.  But  even  he  had 
ceased  to  talk  in  this  strain.  At  least,  he  did  not 
talk  to  me  of  the  war  as  involving  personal  obliga- 
tions. No  doubt  he  took  it  for  granted  that  I  would 
acknowledge  these  obligations  when  the  hour  came,  as 
I  sincerely  believed  I  would;  but  it  was  evident  that 
he  did  not  think  the  hour  had  come. 

Croxon,  in  his  way,  also  represented  the  fundamen- 
tal common  sense  of  the  world.  I  did  not  agree  with 
him.  It  seemed  to  me  a  mean  sort  of  business  to  be 
growing  wealthy  out  of  the  misery  and  necessity  of 
the  world.  But  when  he  declared  that  some  one  must 
supply  the  needs  of  an  embattled  Europe,  and  as  long 
as  he  did  it  on  honest  terms  he  was  entitled  to  his 
profits,  he  took  ground  which  I  knew  to  be  unassail- 
able in  logic.  And,  to  his  credit,  I  must  state,  that  he 
was  by  no  means  indifferent  to  the  tragedy  of  war. 
He  burned  hot  with  rage  over  the  meanness,  malignity 
and  cruelty  of  the  German  invasion  of  Belgium. 

"They  cut  off  the  breasts  of  women  and  the  hands 
of  little  children,"  he  cried  with  a  quivering  voice. 
"They  go  into  battle  with  a  screen  of  old  men  and 
women  in  front  of  them.  It's  said  they  crucify  Ca- 
nadian soldiers.  They're  damned  swine,  they're  not 
men.  I  swear  that  as  long  as  I  live  I'll  never  eat  or 
drink  with  a  German.     I'll  never  trade  with  him.  I'll 


THE  LURE  201 

treat  him  as  a  foul  leper,  and  I  hope  all  the  world  will 
do  the  same." 

His  rage  was  genuine;  it  was  the  rage  of  a  tender- 
hearted man,  whose  relations  with  women  had  always 
been  sympathetic  and  reverent.  He  could  not  con- 
ceive the  sort  of  brute  who  made  war  by  dishonouring 
women  and  bayoneting  babies.  But  for  all  his  anger, 
it  had  never  occurred  to  him  that  America  was  called 
upon  to  interfere.  God  had  set  her  apart  on  a  high 
secure  place  above  the  red  flood  of  battle;  it  wasn't 
for  her  to  plunge  down  into  the  reeking  filth  of  war. 
Let  her  remain  aloof  but  altruistic.  Wasn't  she  do- 
ing far  more  to  help  the  right  side  by  furnishing  am- 
munition and  supplies  than  she  could  by  fighting,  in 
which  case  she  would  want  all  her  ammunition  for 
herself?  Wasn't  that  real  altruism?  Wasn't  it  true 
commonsense  ? 

It  was  hard  to  tell  him  that  the  soul  of  man  never 
found  its  true  expression  in  what  passed  for  common- 
sense,  that  all  the  heroisms  of  the  world  were  achieved 
by  superb  outrages  upon  commonsense. 

I  didn't  contradict  him,  because  I  knew  I  couldn't 
defeat  him  in  argument.  I  should  have  had  only  ideal- 
isms to  oppose  to  his  commonsense,  and,  to  speak 
frankly,  I  felt  that  he  had  so  much  of  reason  on  his 
side  that  I  was  in  danger  of  capitulation.  It  is  not 
easy  to  resist  the  strong  continuous  pressure  of  opin- 
ion exercised  by  men  much  older  than  yourself.  It 
is  particularly  true  of  the  thinker  and  the  artist,  that 
his  remoteness  from  the  rough  realities  of  life  makes 
him  timid  in  the  presence  of  men  accustomed  to  handle 


202  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

large  affairs.  He  knows  very  well  that  his  grasp  on 
facts  is  loose  and  weak.  He  may  be  very  sure  of 
his  idealisms  when  he  rehearses  them  in  solitude,  but 
they  are  apt  to  melt  into  thin  air  when  he  thrusts 
them  out  into  the  clamorous  market-place  of  life. 

Croxon's  attitude  to  the  war  was  after  all  the  gen- 
eral attitude  of  New  York.  The  great  city  sat  be- 
side the  sea,  superbly  aloof  and  complacent,  like  a 
modern  Carthage.  The  ships  came  and  went  as  in 
the  days  of  peace,  the  stock-markets  were  buoyant, 
the  newspapers  spoke  of  increasing  prosperity.  Vast 
streams  of  wealth  were  poured  out  night  by  night 
in  the  hotels,  restaurants,  theatres,  and  resorts  of  pleas- 
ure. The  rich  went  as  usual  to  Newport  or  the  Adi- 
rondacks  in  the  summer,  to  Florida  in  the  winter,  and 
the  cessation  of  European  travel  had  revived  the 
glories  of  more  than  one  resort  which  had  been  for- 
saken and  forgotten.  H  the  worst  came  to  the  worst, 
men  said,  America  was  safe.  No  European  Power 
would  venture  to  attack  her.  Some,  more  frankly 
selfish,  said  that  America  stood  to  gain  by  the  troubles 
of  Europe.  A  weakened  Europe  meant  a  strengthened 
America.  She  had  all  the  winning  cards  in  her  hands, 
and  the  game  was  hers  if  she  would  only  play  it  with 
judgment  and  discretion. 

Other  men,  not  selfish,  but  obsessed  by  ideas  that 
were  the  natural  growth  of  a  life-time  of  unthreat- 
ened  security,  used  the  occasion  to  preach  on  the  folly 
of  war.  In  their  view  all  the  warring  nations  of  Eu- 
rope were  equally  mad.  They  looked  upon  the  far- 
off  vista  of  men  struggling  together  on  red  battlefields 


THE  LURE  203 

from  a  calm  height  of  philosophic  scorn.  Their  phrase 
was,  "A  plague  on  both  your  houses !"  They  affected 
to  disbelieve  the  statements  and  justifications  put  forth 
by  both  contestants.  Upon  the  fearful  wrongs  com- 
mitted in  invaded  Belgium  they  were  conveniently  si- 
lent. Of  the  claim  of  Britain,  that  she  fought  for 
her  pledged  honour,  they  were  sceptical.  All  that  they 
saw  was  a  relapse  into  barbarism  on  the  part  of  all 
the  conflicting  nations,  a  sudden  collapse  of  sanity, — 
causeless,  inconsequent,  capricious.  So  they  preached 
peace  with  frantic  gestures,  talked  as  though  a  na- 
tion that  loved  peace  could  obtain  immunity  from  war 
by  benevolent  intentions,  incited  men  to  put  their  own 
selfish  interests  before  any  foolish  ethic  of  honour, 
which  was  a  mere  figment  in  any  case,  long  ago  dis- 
carded by  the  utilitarian  wisdom  of  mankind.  Their 
propaganda  could  not  be  disregarded.  It  was  so  in- 
sistent, so  passionately  sincere  in  most  cases  and  so 
agreeable  to  human  selfishness,  that  the  multitude  lis- 
tened to  it,  as  to  a  divine  oracle,  and  answered  it  with 
rag-time  protests  that  the  American  mother  didn't  rear 
her  son  to  be  a  soldier. 

Neither  did  she  rear  him  to  be  a  coward,  answered 
other  voices,  which  invoked  the  great  memories  of 
Lexington  and  Gettysburg.  But  these  men  spoke  in 
vain,  although  they  represented  all  that  was  finest  in 
politics,  statesmanship,  and  literature.  They  were  pro- 
nounced dangerous  by  a  large  portion  of  the  press. 
They  were  called  fire-brands.  They  had  ulterior  pur- 
poses to  serve.  They  were  egoists;  eager  above  all 
things  to  keep   themselves   in  the  limelight  of   pub- 


204  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

licity.  So  said  the  general  voice,  but  a  steady  minority 
was  against  them.  They  spoke  as  prophets  in  the 
wilderness,  but,  as  some  dimly  perceived,  they  spoke 
the  language  of  the  future,  because  they  spoke  for  the 
souls  of  men.  In  all  their  utterances  there  was  the 
strong  confidence  of  men  who  knew  that  the  time  must 
come  when  men  would  hear  them;  and  so  they  held 
to  their  course  undismayed  by  public  indifference,  un- 
regardful  of  newspaper  ji1)es  and  denunciations. 

To  me,  moving  through  this  strange  world  of  con- 
flicting opinion,  the  path  was  difficult.  I  was  swept 
hither  and  thither  by  the  racing  currents,  pushed  out 
of  my  path  again  and  again  by  forces  which  I  could 
not  overcome.  I  was  living  in  a  country  not  at  war, 
among  a  people  who  detested  war,  and  were  resolved 
at  all  costs  to  keep  out  of  it.  The  stern  features  of 
Duty,  so  clearly  visible  to  men  who  dwelt  in  a  men- 
aced England,  were  dim  and  vague  to  a  dweller  in 
an  unmenaced  America.  Had  New  York  been  sud- 
denly bombarded  by  German  guns  I  knew  what  New 
York  would  do,  and  what  I  should  do.  At  the  first 
dropping  bomb  we  should  all  have  leapt  to  arms.  Had 
the  merest  increment  of  Hun  barbarity  and  lust  de- 
filed the  shores  of  Long  Island,  within  an  hour  a 
great  flame  of  wrath  would  have  swept  from  the  At- 
lantic to  the  Pacific.  But  no  such  things  happened, 
nor  were  imagined  possible.  Our  Carthage  slept  be- 
side the  tranquil  sea,  proudly  strong,  contemptuously 
indifferent  to  distant  danger.  The  golden  sun  of 
spring  shone  upon  the  harbour,  and  day  by  day  men 
rose  to  the  secure  possession  of  their  hopes  and  plans 


THE  LURE  205 

and  programmes  of  pleasurable  life.  They  woke  from 
sleep  with  no  fear  of  what  the  day  might  bring, 
looked  into  the  eyes  of  wives  and  children  with  un- 
tested affection,  read  the  morning's  news  of  distant 
battles  with  a  casual  glance,  went  upon  their  way  with 
happy  thoughts  singing  in  the  brain;  and,  if  they 
prayed  at  all,  made  brief  ejaculation  of  thankfulness 
to  God  that  in  His  discriminating  wisdom  He  had  put 
a  thousand  leagues  of  sea  around  America  for  her  in- 
violate defence. 

Here  was  the  Lure,  It  was  like  Bunyan's  Delectable 
Mountains,  in  whose  drowsy  air  men  forget  the  clash- 
ing swords  of  the  conflict  with  Apollyon :  like  his 
Enchanted  Ground,  where  men  sink  into  death,  with- 
out the  warning  of  violent  distemper,  mistaking  it 
for  sleep. 

It  came  to  me  in  the  cheerful  indifference  of  the 
men  I  met  to  the  threat  of  war.  It  was  revealed  to 
me  in  their  tacit  reconciliation  to  a  world  tragedy,  as 
something  in  which  they  were  not  concerned.  It  was 
a  kind  of  spiritual  languor,  dulling  the  edge  of  thought, 
wreathing  the  brow  with  the  poppies  of  a  pleasant  stu- 
pefaction. It  wore  the  guise  of  Croxon's  genial  com- 
monsense,  of  Herridge's  calm  pursuit  of  habitual  aims, 
in  spite  of  a  world  on  fire.  And,  alas,  it  came  to  me 
with  an  even  more  potent  draught  of  forget  fulness, 
in  my  love  of  Alice.  More  and  more  my  heart  fol- 
lowed her,  and,  following  her,  the  difficult  quests  of 
life  were  in  abeyance. 


2o6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 


II 


I  saw  her  every  day.  She  would  meet  me  with  the 
pleased  alacrity  of  a  child,  eager  for  happiness.  We 
went  together  to  the  play  or  to  concerts,  we  walked 
on  fine  afternoons  in  the  Park,  we  discovered  strange 
tea-houses,  and  knew  the  intimacy  of  shared  meals. 
She  was  always  bright  and  cheerful,  and  she  did  not 
attempt  to  disguise  the  pleasure  she  found  in  my 
society.  But  she  remained  elusive,  and  had  a  curious 
sort  of  inaccessibility.  There  were  moments  when  it 
seemed  that  I  had  but  to  stretch  out  my  hand  and 
pluck  the  ripe  fruit  of  her  love,  but  at  the  first  indi- 
cation of  passion  on  my  part,  it  was  withdrawn,  like 
the  vanishing  feasts  in  old-fashioned  pantomimes.  A 
blunt  insensitive  observer  might  have  said  that  she  was 
merely  flirting  with  me,  but  he  would  have  been  en- 
tirely wrong.  The  challenge  of  her  eyes  was  too  frank 
for  coquetry,  the  touch  of  her  hand  on  my  arm  too 
casual  for  design. 

She  had  little  girlish  theories  of  life  and  conduct 
which  she  explained  with  amusing  touches  of  self- 
satire.  All  that  she  really  knew  of  life  was  comprised 
in  her  unhappy  school-days  and  her  visit  to  the 
Vernons. 

"They  were  always  telling  us  to  be  good  when  I 
was  at  school,"  she  said,  "but  they  didn't  seem  to  see 
that  what  they  meant  by  being  good  was  simply  being 
a  solemn  prig.  I  tried  it,  and  it  didn't  agree  with 
my   constitution.      How   is   it   that  goodness  always 


THE  LURE  207 

wears  the  wrong  hats,  and  that  the  other  thing  at  least 
manages  to  dress  itself  attractively?" 

She  drew  a  comic  picture  of  the  excellent  lady  who 
was  the  President  of  the  school. 

"She  was  plain  as  a  plate,  and  straight  up  and  down 
as  a  broom-stick,  and  she  snuffled.  Why  is  it  good 
people  always  snuffle?" 

"Do   they?"   I   ventured. 

"Always.  Miss  Arabella  Tabraham — that  was  her 
repulsive  name — always  had  a  bad  cold.  I  used  to 
wonder  whether  her  goodness  produced  her  colds  or 
her  colds  produced  her  goodness.  O,  and  I  must  tell 
you  this — it's  something  you  ought  to  know — she  had 
a  real  horror  of  men.  She  used  to  deliver  a  lecture 
once  a  month,  in  a  thin  acidulous  voice,  on  the  perils 
which  young  girls  encountered  by  the  least  associa- 
tion with  men.  She  said  men  hunted  them — they 
were  all  bad  designing  creatures  whose  chief  employ- 
ment was  this  wicked  form  of  sport.  I'm  quite  sure 
no  one  ever  hunted  her,  poor  thing.  But  you'd  think 
from  the  way  she  spoke  she'd  had  the  experience  of  a 
Cleopatra." 

"I  think  I  know  the  type,"  I  said.  "I  once  had  a 
schoolmaster " 

"No,"  she  interrupted,  "don't  tell  me  you  ever  had 
a  schoolmaster  who  could  have  resembled  Miss  Ta- 
braham. It's  against  nature.  No  man,  however 
Pharisaic  he  may  be,  can  possibly  equal  an  old  maid 
turned  sour.  A  spoiled  man,  spoiled  by  the  wrong 
kind  of  goodness,  I  mean,  becomes  unctuous  and  ran- 


2o8  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

cid   like   bad   butter,   but  a   spoiled  woman  becomes 
vinegar." 

"There's  a  right  kind  of  goodness,  then?" 
"O,  I  suppose  so.    Father's  good,  I  think." 
"Pie's  kind-hearted  and  generous,"  I  said. 
"He's  a   lot  more  than   that,"   she   said  earnestly. 
"He  loved  my  mother,  and  though  she  died  years  ago 
when  I  was  a  child,  there's  not  a  day  when   father 
doesn't  think  of  her.    He's  not  aware  there's  any  other 
woman  in  the  world  since  mother  left  it.     Sometimes 
I   feel  as  though  he  isn't  quite  aware  that  I'm  his 
daughter." 

"It's  a  wonderful  thing  when  a  man  loves  a  woman 
like  that,  isn't  it,  Alice?" 

"Yes,  and  a  very  rare  thing.  Most  men  aren't  ca- 
pable of  it.  Doesn't  the  Bible  say  somewhere,  'He 
that  loveth  his  wife  loveth  himself?  O,  you  needn't 
laugh.  I  know  lots  of  things  in  the  Bible.  The  pious 
Tabraham  used  to  give  us  Bible  lessons  every  Friday 
afternoon,  and  that  was  one  of  her  favourite  quota- 
tions. She  said  that  what  it  meant  was  that  marriage 
was  merely  an  ingenious  form  of  masculine  selfish- 


ness." 


"But  you  don't  think  it  that,  Alice?" 

"O,  I  don't  know,"  she  replied  with  a  little  peal 
of  laughter.  "I'm  not  yet  emancipated  from  my  Ta- 
braham, you  know.  I  really  do  think  life  is  quite  ro- 
mantic sometimes,  but  just  when  I've  made  my  mind 
up  to  be  romantic,  I  hear  old  Tabraham's  snuffle  behind 
me,  and  I  collapse.  I  wish  she  could  see  us  now,  hav- 
ing tea  together;  wouldn't  it  be  fun?    I  believe  she'd 


THE  LURE  209 

snatch  me  to  her  bony  bosom,  and  report  you  to  the 
police,  Sir  Gareth," 

Our  conversations  often  ended  in  jesting.  The  train 
of  thought  seemed  duly  laid  for  seriousness;  the  slow 
red  spark  of  love  began  to  creep  forward,  when  all 
at  once  an  explosion  happened,  and  all  my  hopes 
shot  up  and  fell  in  firework-stars  of  laughter. 

I  often  cursed  the  day  when  we  had  invented  that 
play-act  idyll  of  Gareth  and  Lynette.  It  had  now 
become  a  subterfuge  which  expelled  reality.  When 
she  called  me  Gareth,  it  was  as  though  she  said,  ''Re- 
member, we're  only  play-acting.  Don't  be  serious, 
or   you'll   spoil   our   little   drama." 

Now  and  then  the  sutberfuge  disappeared,  and  we 
had  grave  moments  of  reality.  I  recall  one  of  these, 
on  an  April  afternoon,  as  we  wandered  through  the 
Egyptian  courts  of  the  Metropolitan  Museum.  We 
had  gazed  upon  those  vast  sarcophagi,  shaped  from 
enduring  granite  for  the  dust  of  kings,  had  looked 
on  that  childish  form  that  once  bore  the  dignity  of 
a  royal  name,  and  had  wondered  what  her  real  life 
had  been,  and  whether  she  had  tasted  human  love 
before  she  died,  and  what  lover  kissed  her  lips  before 
the  soft-footed  embalmers  filed  into  the  frescoed  cham- 
ber, bearing  the  instruments  of  their  melancholy  trade. 
We  had  come  at  last  to  that  strange  Tomb,  trans- 
ported stone  by  stone  from  the  desert  of  Sakkara,  to 
be  recreated  in  the  indecent  bald  publicity  of  New 
York.  We  entered  the  narrow  portal  of  hewn  stone, 
polished  with  the  passage  of  the  centuries,  and  gazed 
through  the  narrow  slit,  beyond  which  was  the  low 


210  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

pedestal  on  which  the  wooden  effigy  of  the  dead  man 
once  stood. 

AHce  shivered. 

"Come  away,"  she  said. 

"You're  not  cold,  are  you?" 

"Cold  to  the  heart,"  she  answered.  "It's  like  look- 
ing on  Death.  I  can  hear  his  feet  moving  through 
these  icy  chambers." 

We  came  back  to  the  great  hall,  and  sat  down  upon 
a  bench.  The  cheerful  light  shone  through  the  high 
windows,  and  a  tribe  of  girls,  led  by  a  smiling  teacher, 
moved  with  chattering  voices  across  the  marble  floor, 
and  vanished  up  the  central  stair-case. 

"Doesn't  it  make  you  feel  as  though  nothing  mat- 
tered?" she  said.  "Our  struggling,  our  hopes  and 
fears,  our  wars — man  has  gone  through  it  all  be- 
fore, and  so  many  times.  And  what's  the  use  of  it 
all?  It  all  ends  in  the  same  way.  Gareth,  it  fright- 
ens me.  It  makes  me  feel  so  insignificant.  You  and 
I  don't  amount  to  much,  do  we,  when  we  stand  in  a 
place  like  that?  I've  a  feeling  that  God  is  laughing 
at  us." 

"Perhaps  He  pities  us,"  I  said. 

"That's  worse.  I  hate  being  pitied.  I'd  rather 
be  laughed  at,  for  at  least  I  can  laugh  back.  But 
I  don't  feel  like  laughing,  either." 

Her  distress  was  so  visible  and  sincere  that  I  sought 
to  comfort  her;  but  I  could  find  nothing  better  to 
say  than  perhaps  these  dead  people  were  happy  while 
they  lived. 

"That's  no  comfort,"  she  replied.    "It  doesn't  seem 


THE  LURE  211 

worth  while  to  live  and  have  your  heart  broken  by 
love,  when  it's  so  soon  over." 

"That  young  princess  we  looked  at  yonder  didn't 
feel  like  that,  I'll  be  bound.  Probably  it  was  her  one 
consolation  that  she  had  tasted  love  before  she  died." 

"And  why  did  she  die,  Gareth?  I  can  tell  you. 
She  saw  her  man  go  away  to  war.  They  were  always 
fighting  in  those  days,  weren't  they?  And  she  stood 
on  a  terrace  one  day,  and  thought  what  a  pleasant 
sound  the  Nile  wind  made  among  the  palms,  and  was 
full  of  happy  thoughts,  thinking  how  kind  she  would 
be  to  her  lover  when  he  came  back.  And  then  she 
saw  a  slow  procession  coming  up  the  road,  and  heard 
flutes  playing  very  softly  and  sadly,  and  on  an  open 
bier  she  saw  a  youth,  and  knew  he  was  her  lover — 
and  that  was  the  day  she  died.  And  then  she  was 
sorry  that  she'd  loved  him  so  much,  for  it  was  her 
love    for  him   that  killed   her." 

"She  wasn't  sorry,"  I  cried.  "She  was  glad  she 
had  loved  him,  and  even  glad  he'd  died  like  a  brave 
man." 

"Then  she  wasn't  like  me,  Gareth.  I  couldn't  bear 
to  love  a  man  who  left  me  to  go  to  the  wars.  I  should 
die  long  before  he  came  back.  I  should  be  so  lonely. 
The  man  who  loved  me  would  have  to  be  a  man  who'd 
swear  he'd  never  leave  me." 

"Do  you  mean  that,  Alice?" 

"I  think  I  do.  Isn't  it  what  any  woman  ought  to 
feel  about  the  man  she  loved?" 

"If  I  went  to  the  war,  Alice ?" 

"My  dear  Gareth,  why  do  }^ou  spoil  my  little  story 


212  TPIE  WAR  EAGLE 

with  personal  applications?  I  was  talking  of  an  Egyp- 
tian princess." 

"I  thought  you  were  talking  of  yourself  in  the  end 
of  the  story,  Alice." 

"Was  I?  I'm  sure  I  don't  know.  Let's  get  out 
into  the  sunshine.  I  feel  as  if  this  place  was  haunted 
— as  if  that  dead  girl  yonder  was  making  me  say 
things  I'm  not  responsible  for." 

She  rose  quickly,   smiling,  but  her  face  was  pale. 

"You  see,  I  can  make  up  a  romance  almost  as  well 
as  you,"  she  said  lightly. 

"Was  it  all  romance?"  I  whispered. 

She  made  no  reply,  and  we  moved  silently  through 
the  long  hall  and  came  out  into  the  sunlit  street. 


Ill 

We  saw  a  little  play  one  night,  so  delicately  fash- 
ioned, so  simply  and  sweetly  contrived,  that  it  was  like 
a  strain  of  perfect  poetry  miraculously  interposed 
among  the  banalities  of  the  New  York  theatre.  It 
breathed  the  intoxicating  freshness  of  youth  and  first 
love,  and  blew  over  the  forgotten  footlights  the  per- 
fume of  woods  and  gardens,  so  genuine  that  the  soul 
was  bathed  and  cleansed,  as  if  washed  with  morning 
dew.  Pierrot  stretched  out  a  thoughtless  hand  to  pluck 
the  flower  of  a  young  girl's  heart;  Pierrot  came  back 
to  find  the  garden  withered,  and  to  know  too  late  that 
his  love  was  sacred  and  passionate — that  was  all  the 
story,  but  it  was  interpreted  with   such  fineness  of 


THE  LURE  213 

touch  that  it  became  an  idyll,  a  poem  that  moved  the 
subtlest  springs  of  emotion  and  imagination. 

Croxon  was  with  us  that  night,  and  I  never  saw 
him  so  moved.  He  was  thrilled  and  softened;  the 
unrestrained  tears  ran  down  his  face,  and  I  could  hear 
his  sighs  as  the  pathetic  tale  reached  its  climax.  When 
Pierrot  sang  his  remorseful  song  before  the  empty- 
altar  of  love,  and  buried  his  face  in  the  withered  flow- 
ers of  the  weed-grown  garden,  Croxon  leant  forward 
like  a  man  entranced,  as  if  he  too  were  gripped  with 
an  infinite  regret  for  fair  gifts  misused  and  precious 
treasures  wasted. 

I  myself  was  scarcely  less  afifected,  but  by  different 
causes.  I  knew  myself  gazing  into  the  very  eyes  of 
Love,  Love  the  Master-spirit  of  the  world.  Nothing 
seemed  worth  while  but  Love.  All  the  poor  ambitions 
of  my  life  dissolved  into  negligible  dust.  To  win  a 
love  like  the  love  of  this  young  girl,  so  pure  and 
tender,  what  would  not  a  man  give?  If  he  should 
even  pay  his  honour  for  it,  was  it  not  worth  the  price? 
If  he  should  die  in  the  very  act  of  its  possession,  was 
he  not  overpaid  by  a  moment's  ecstasy  for  all  his  loss? 
And  what  if  I  should  die  before  knowing  that  ecstatic 
moment?  Life  was  uncertain:  death  hid  in  the  with- 
ered garden.  It  would  not  greatly  matter  if  his  ar- 
row found  me,  if  I  could  die  with  my  lips  upon  the 
lips  of  Love.  But  to  die  without  that  kiss,  without 
that  commingling  of  the  soul,  here  was  disaster,  tragic 
and  irreparable.  One  could  pass  into  the  fires  of 
hell  happy  with  that  kiss  upon  the  mouth;  one  could 


214  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

refuse  a  barren  heaven,  if  that  kiss  had  not  been 
known. 

Alice  sat  beside  me,  her  face  a  pale  flame  in  the 
dusk  of  the  shadowy  house.  Once  I  touched  her  hand; 
she  held  it  fast  for  an  instant.  Pierrot's  song  came 
thrilling  and  yearning  through  the  gloom.  Pierrot's 
body  lay  prone  and  white  before  that  cold  altar.  Her 
eyes  met  mine,  in  a  long  steady  questioning  gaze, 
and  were  withdrawn.  When  the  play  closed  we  rose 
in  silence,  fearful  of  speech.  I  think  we  both  feared 
lest  we  should  say  too  much  or  too  little. 

When  we  reached  the  hotel,  Alice  went  to  bed 
immediately,  and  I  was  left  alone  with  Croxon.  He 
motioned  me  to  a  chair,  lit  a  cigar,  passed  me  one, 
and  we  were  both  silent.  I  rose  to  go,  for  it  was 
midnight. 

"Don't  go,"  he  said.     "I  want  to  speak  to  you." 

He  began  to  walk  up  and  down  the  room  with  long 
strides.  At  length  he  stood  beside  my  chair,  and 
laid  a  heavy  hand  upon  my  shoulder. 

"I  once  loved  like  that,"  he  said  slowly.  "Did  I  tell 
you  she  died  when  I  was  away  ?" 

"Yes.  You  told  me  your  wife  died  while  you  were 
on  a  trip  in  the  North-west." 

"And  I  came  back  to  find  a  withered  garden,  just 
like  that  man  in  the  play.  She  loved  that  garden.  No 
one  cared  for  it  after  she  died.  She  had  some  roses 
on  a  trellis  by  the  door.  The  first  thing  I  noticed 
when  I  came  back  was  that  the  trellis  was  broken 
down.  They  told  me  the  men  broke  it  when  they  car- 
ried out  her  coffin." 


THE  LURE  215 

He  was  not  looking  at  me.  His  eyes  were  fixed  on 
things  far  away. 

"And  I  went  away  from  her  just  as  that  man  in 
the  play  did,  but  for  worse  reasons.  He  wanted  to 
be  famous  and  taste  pleasure,  all  I  wanted  was  money. 
Money,  by  God,  just  that!  That's  the  way  we  men 
do.  That's  why  so  many  of  us  come  back  to  with- 
ered gardens.  I  wonder  whether  you're  that  kind  of 
man." 

He  removed  his  hand  from  my  shoulder,  and  pushed 
my  chair  round,  so  that  he  gazed  full  into  my  eyes. 

'T  want  to  ask  you  a  question,"  he  said  abruptly. 
"Do  you  love  Alice?" 

"I  do.    With  all  my  heart." 

"Does  she  love  you?" 

"I'm  not  sure." 

"You're  not  sure.  Well,  I  am.  I'm  not  blind.  But 
there's  something  else  I'm  not  so  sure  about.  I'm  not 
sure  whether  you  love  her  in  the  way  a  woman  wants 
to  be  loved." 

"I  don't  think  I  quite  understand,  Sir!" 

"Well,  I'm  going  to  make  you  understand,"  he  said 
with  a  grim  tightening  of  the  mouth. 

His  voice  became  intense  and  almost  fierce. 

"You've  made  love  to  my  little  girl,"  he  said,  "and 
I  don't  blame  you.  I've  never  tried  to  interfere,  be- 
cause I  want  her  to  be  happy,  and  she  knows  better 
than  I  what  will  make  her  happy.  I'd  let  her  marry 
the  bell-boy  if  she  really  wanted  to.  I  don't  say  that 
offensively — I  know  you're  clever  and  all  that,  but 
if  you  weren't  it  wouldn't  make  any  difference.     If 


2i6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

you  can  make  her  happy  I'm  content;  but  that's  the 
point.     Can  you?" 

"I  would  try.  I  would  give  anything  to  do  it." 
"You  would  give  anything?  Well,  let's  come  to 
a  plain  test.  You've  a  great  idea  of  enlisting  pres- 
ently; I've  heard  you  say  so,  and  I  suppose  you  mean 
it.  That  means  you'd  love  her  and  leave  her,  like  the 
man  in  the  play.  You'd  do  just  what  I  did,  and  give 
a  hundred  good  reasons  for  doing  it.  I  don't  care 
what  the  reasons  are.  The  fact  is  what  I  see:  Alice 
left  to  break  her  heart  in  her  withered  garden.  You'd 
give  anything  to  make  her  happy.  The  words  are 
easily  said.  All  of  us  say  them  at  some  time  or 
other  in  our  lives.  Do  you  mean  what  you  say?  Will 
you  give  up  this  mad  notion  of  enlisting  for  the  sake 
of  Alice?" 

'T  don't  believe  she'd  wish  me  to " 

"That's  not  the  question,"  he  interrupted.  "Women 
don't  speak  their  wishes.  My  wife  would  never  set 
any  wish  of  hers  against  my  plans.  When  I  went  on 
that  trip  she  packed  my  bag  as  usual,  and  smiled  cheer- 
fully, and  never  let  on  what  she  felt.  That's  the  way 
of  good  women.  They  think  of  the  man,  'Well,  he 
ought  to  know,'  and,  if  he  doesn't  know,  they're  too 
proud  and  sweet  to  tell  him.  They're  so  afraid  of 
being  selfish  themselves  that  they  make  us  selfish." 

"I  would  be  willing  to  leave  the  decision  to  Alice, 
Mr.  Croxon." 

"No,  that  won't  do.  Just  think  it  over,  and  tell 
me  if  that  isn't  plain  cowardice.  Of  course  she'd  do 
what  she  thought  you  wanted  her  to  do,  if  she  loved 


THE  LURE  217 

you.  As  I  see  it,  you've  no  right  to  put  her  in  that 
position.  It's  for  you  to  decide,  and  to  think  more 
of  her  than  of  yourself  in  deciding." 

He  began  his  restless  pacing  up  and  down  the  room 
again.  Presently  he  drew  his  chair  close  to  mine, 
and  said  in  a  kinder  voice,  "I  won't  ask  you  to  decide 
to-night.  I'm  not  a  religious  man,  I'm  ashamed  to 
say;  but  when  I  was  married  there  was  one  thing  the 
parson  said,  which  I've  never  forgotten.  He  asked 
me  if  I  understood  that  marriage  meant  forsaking 
everything  for  the  sake  of  one's  wife,  and  I  said  I 
did  understand  it,  and  would  do  it,     'Forsaking  all 

other '     I  took  that  to  mean  giving  up  not  only 

one's  friends,  but  one's  own  personal  desires  for 
the  sake  of  one's  wife.  Well,  I  didn't  do  it.  I  didn't 
forsake  anything  I  wanted.  My  wife  did  the  forsak- 
ing. I  lied  when  I  promised  to  give  up  everything  for 
her,  and  my  lie  has  cost  me  dear." 

As  I  left  he  put  his  arm  round  my  shoulder. 

"I  believe  I've  a  fondness  for  you,"  he  said.  "I'd 
love  to  think  of  yor  as  my  son,  if  you  and  Alice  can 
be  quite  sure  of  one  another.  But  remember  what 
I've  said — Alice  must  be  first  in  all  your  thoughts — 
first  now  and  always,  or  you  shan't  have  her.  I've 
learned  my  lesson,  and  if  it's  come  too  late  to  help 
me,  I  can  use  it  to  protect  Alice,  and  I  will." 

I  went  out,  walking  through  the  empty  streets  to 
my  hotel,  and  all  the  way  Pierrot's  remorseful  song 
followed  me.  It  rose  in  a  broken-hearted  wail  to  the 
cold  stars,  and  with  it  came  the  vision  of  a  garden, 
undeflowered  and  fresh  with  dew,  where  young  love 


2i8  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

stood  tiptoe  and  tense,  waiting  the  kiss  that  was  the 
seal  of  destiny.  How  could  I  turn  my  back  on  that 
promised  bliss?  By  what  diviner  oath  could  I  be 
consecrated  than  by  that  which  drew  me  to  the  altar 
of  pledged  and  sacred  Love? 


IV 

In  those  days  even  Henry  Trafiford  became  my 
tempter. 

lie  did  not  mean  to  be,  and  nothing,  I  am  sure, 
was  further  from  his  thoughts.  He  had  already 
pointed  out  my  duty,  and  he  was  not  the  kind  of 
man  to  permit  the  capitulation  of  duty  to  affection. 
But  in  his  very  affection  for  me  lay  a  subtle  snare. 
He  had  a  pride  in  me  which  a  generous  father  feels 
for  a  son.  His  whole  mind  was  set  on  my  success 
in  literature.  I  never  met  him  when  he  did  not  dis- 
cuss my  work  with  magnanimous  appreciation  and 
seek  to  guide  me  with  his  larger  wisdom  toward  the 
loftiest  goals  of  the  writer. 

"From  whom  much  is  given,  much  is  required,"  he 
would  say,  with  a  kindly  smile. 

And  then  he  would  go  on  to  speak  of  literature 
as  a  sacred  profession,  of  a  true  gift  for  writing  as 
a  great  possession,  a  lamp  carried  down  the  ages, 
whose  flame  must  be  sedulously  fed,  whose  extinc- 
tion was  a  world-calamity. 

"H  Keats  had  only  lived  another  dozen  years," 
he  would  exclaim,   "he  might  have   rivalled   Shake- 


THE  LURE  219 

speare.  Even  in  what  he  did,  a  mere  boy's  work, 
there  were  quahties  so  fine  that  Tennyson  rightly  said 
*he  was  the  greatest  of  us  all.'  " 

It  was  hard  to  resist  the  generous  implications  of 
remarks  like  these.  Even  to  be  named  in  the  same 
breath  with  Keats — think  of  it!  And  I  knew  that 
Trafford  was  a  man  very  sparing  of  his  praise.  He 
found  little  in  modern  books  to  admire :  "thin  dupli- 
cations," he  called  them,  "of  a  vanished  excellence; 
at  best,  poor  copies  of  original  genius."  I  knew  that 
he  rarely  read  the  books  he  published,  unless  they 
were  histories  or  books  of  scientific  value.  He  left 
the  actual  business  of  his  firm  to  others,  to  shrewd 
readers  and  managers  who  understood  the  art  of  trad- 
ing in  books,  and  little  else.  They,  in  turn,  regarded 
him  with  a  certain  reverence  for  his  learning  and 
character,  but  with  disdain  for  his  indifference  to  the 
practical  details  of  publishing.  "If  we  published  the 
kind  of  books  Mr.  Trafford  likes,"  his  manager  said 
to  me  one  day,  "we  should  go  out  of  business  in  a 
year.  Fortunately  for  him  and  for  us,  he's  content 
to  leave  things  in  our  hands,  and  rarely  interferes 
with  our  decisions." 

There  was  no  offensive  self-complacency  in  the  man- 
ager's remark:  it  was  a  plain  statement  of  obvious 
fact.  Trafford  was  too  sincere  and  disinterested  a 
lover  of  literature  for  its  own  sake  to  be  quick  at  dis- 
covering the  popular  values  in  inferior  books. 

It  was  all  the  more  remarkable  to  me  that  he  should 
have  become  so  frankly  interested  in  my  work,  for  I 
was  by  way  of  becoming  a  popular  writer.     It  ere- 


220  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ated  a  curious  situation,  for  in  the  mind  of  the  very 
efficient  manager  Trafford's  appreciation  suggested  a 
doul)t  as  to  the  value  of  my  work,  since  the  kind  of 
book  which  Trafford  most  appreciated  was  usually 
the  book  which  the  manager  found  of  the  least  mercan- 
tile value. 

The  effect  of  Trafford's  influence  on  my  mind  will 
be  easily  understood.  Without  at  all  meaning  it,  he 
re-enthroned  literary  ideals  as  the  supreme  ideals  in 
my  life.  They  had  been  deposed — at  least,  partially. 
I  was  ready  to  discard  them.  They  appeared  trivial 
compared  with  the  supreme  things  for  which  men 
were  struggling  and  dying.  His  too  generous  praise 
revived  them,  and  gave  them  new  authority.  His  sin- 
cere picture  of  the  writer  carrying  a  lamp  down  the 
road  of  the  ages  naturally  raised  anew  the  question 
of  the  worth  of  the  writer's  work.  The  old  selfish 
plea  that  genius  was  sacrosanct,  that  it  claimed  ex- 
emption from  the  sacrifices  of  ordinary  men,  made 
itself  heard  again,  and  spoke  with  the  voice  of  reason 
and  wisdom. 

"I  think  you  exaggerate  the  value  of  my  work,"  I 
protested.  "And  I'm  not  sure  whether  you  don't  ex- 
aggerate the  value  of  all  literary  work." 

"Do  I  ?"  he  answered.  "Do  you  think  it  possible 
to  exaggerate  what  the  great  writers  have  meant  to 
the  world?  They've  fed  the  mind  of  the  world,  are 
feeding  it  to  this  day." 

"A  very  small  part  of  the  world,  surely?" 

"But  the  dominating  part — the  part  that  includes 
the  thinkers,  by  whom  the  rest  are  governed." 


THE  LURE  221 

"Do  the  thinkers  indeed  govern?  They  don't  in 
New  York.  He  would  be  a  bold  man  who  asserted 
that  the  Common  Council  of  New  York  was  composed 
of  thinkers." 

"My  dear  boy,  don't  be  cynical.  By  the  cynic  noth- 
ing is  truly  seen.  You  know  very  well  what  I  mean. 
I'm  not  thinking  of  politicians.  I'm  thinking  of  states- 
men. And  I'm  thinking  of  men  much  more  important 
than  statesmen;  the  creators  of  opinion,  the  men  who 
supply  the  dynamic  of  human  thought,  the  organ- 
isers of  human  energy.  To  these  men  the  great 
writers  are  the.  sources  of  light.  They  draw  from 
them  impulse  and  inspiration.  Human  life  would  have 
suffered  very  little  loss  if  Alexander  had  not  lived. 
But  it  would  have  been  infinitely  poorer  if  Plato  and 
Socrates  had  never  lived.  He  who  adds  a  page  of 
fine  thinking  to  human  literature  has  done  far  more 
to  enrich  mankind  than  the  man  who  adds  a  province 
to  an  empire.  If  the  great  Elizabeth  had  never  lived 
England  would  have  managed  to  do  without  her,  but 
if  Shakespeare  had  not  lived  the  chief  glory  of  Eng- 
land would  be  lacking.  If  we  were  driven  to  choose 
between  Elizabeth  and  Shakespeare  we  should  all  vote 
for   Shakespeare,   shouldn't  we?" 

"I've  no  doubt  you  and  I  would,  but  would  men 
in  general?" 

"Men  in  general  would  accept  the  verdict  because 
they  would  know  it  was  the  verdict  of  those  who  had 
the  best  right  to  pronounce  a  verdict.  And,  besides, 
even  men  in  general  are  obstinately  aware  that  thoughts 
do  really  govern  the  world.    Their  very  religion  makes 


222  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

that  evident.  They  know  that  Cxsar  Augustus  in  all 
his  glory  was  a  person  of  much  less  value  to  the  world 
than  a  young  Carpenter,  in  the  most  obscure  province 
of  his  empire,  who  uttered  thoughts  and  truths  which 
have  survived  the  Roman  Empire." 

"Yes,  tliat's  true.  But  even  then  there's  tlie  question 
of  my  poor  work,  which  you  value  much  too  highly." 

"Your  work  isn't  poor — don't  use  these  shop-worn 
phrases  of  depreciation  to  me.  You  and  I  can  afford 
to  be  honest  with  one  another.  You  don't  really  think 
it  poor:  why  say  so?" 

He  had  risen  from  his  chair,  and  stood  beside  the 
fire,  gazing  at  me  earnestly,  his  dark  eyes  very  bright, 
his  face  glowing  with  unusual  emotion. 

"Shall  I  tell  you  what  is  the  chief  peril  of  you  young 
writers?"  he  said.  "It  is  that  you  don't  realise  that 
literature  is  a  vocation.  You  don't  feel  about  it  as  Mil- 
ton felt,  for  example.  You  don't  lie  awake  at  night 
praying  God  to  give  you  the  instruction  of  the  Holy 
Ghost  in  your  work,  as  he  did.  You  don't  aim  at  the 
highest.  You're  content  with  good  craftsmanship, 
you're  not  conscious  of  a  prophetic  message.  Isn't 
that  so?" 

"We're  afraid  to  think  in  that  way.  It  would  appear 
immodest  and  presumptuous." 

"And  it's  because  you're  afraid,  because  you  don't 
take  yourselves  seriously,  that  you  produce  poor  work. 
Of  course  I  know  that  for  a  great  many  of  the  men 
writing  to-day  such  ideals  are  absurd.  All  they  aim 
at  is  instant  popularity,  and  its  substantial  rewards. 
It  would  be  waste  of  breath  for  me  to  argue  with  them 


THE  LURE  223 

that  literature  was  a  solemn  vocation,  for  they're  in- 
capable of  producing  anything  that  can  be  called  liter- 
ature, even  by  the  friendliest  critic." 

"They  do  their  best,"  I  replied,  for  I  was  moved 
to  defend  mv  class. 

"No,  that's  just  what  they  don't  do,"  said  Trafford. 
"Most  of  them  could  do  much  better  work  than  they 
are  doing,  but  they're  afraid  it  wouldn't  pay.  They 
do  the  thing  that  appears  most  profitable,  but  not  their 
best." 

"There  are  such  persons  as  editors,  and  publishers' 
managers,  and  publishers'  readers,"  I  remarked. 

He  laughed  at  that. 

"Herridge,  for  example,  and  my  own  most  efficient 
business  manager,  eh  ?  O,  I  admit  they  hold  the  doors 
of  literature,  and  haven't  the  least  insight  into  what 
constitutes  a  good  book.  Do  you  remember  Captain 
Nares  in  Stevenson's  Wrecker?  His  ideal  of  bliss 
was  to  lie  in  a  hammock  reading  E.  P.  Roe  and  Shake- 
speare! He  didn't  know  the  difference,  and  if  the 
men  we're  thinking  of  are  not  quite  as  ignorant  as  that, 
yet  their  standards  of  literary  value  are  just  as  con- 
fused." 

"They  hold  the  door,  however.   Don't  forget  that!" 

"They  can't  hold  out  against  a  real  writer  of 
genius!" 

"They've  done  it  more  than  once." 

"Only  for  a  time.  The  man  of  genius  always  comes 
to  his  own  in  the  long  run." 

"It's  often  a  very  long  run,  isn't  it?" 

"It's  a  surer  road  to  fame  than  the  short  cut  of  im- 


224  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

mediate  popularity,  which  is  usually  the  result  which 
a  mediocre  mind  wins  from  pleasing  mediocre  minds." 

He  was  so  much  in  earnest,  that  I  was  moved  by 
an  impulse  of  sincerity. 

"Mr.  Trafford,"  I  said,  "you  invite  me  to  be  egois- 
tic, and  for  once  I  will  be  so,  because  I  know  you 
won't  misunderstand  me.  I  do  believe  in  my  own 
work.  From  my  boyhood  I've  had  one  great  ideal, 
to  write  a  book  that  would  live.  I've  never  thought 
of  my  work  as  a  trade,  but  as  a  vocation.  I  have 
some  sense  of  gifts  entrusted  to  me,  which  I  must  use 
in  the  spirit  of  a  sacred  obligation,  and  I'm  not  ashamed 
to  say  I've  often  prayed  that  I  might  use  them  worth- 
ily, and  be  saved  from  the  dishonour  of  cheap  suc- 


cess." 


"I  was  sure  you  felt  in  that  way,"  he  said.  "If 
I  hadn't  been  I  shouldn't  have  felt  the  interest  in  you 
that  I  do.  When  I  read  your  first  book  I  picked  you 
out  as  a  man,  one  of  the  few  living  men,  with  a  real 
message  that  posterity  might  value.  Therefore  I  say, 
be  true  to  your  vocation.  Never  doubt  that  it  is  real. 
Don't  let  yourself  be  deflected  from  it.  It's  the  highest 
of  all  human  vocations,  it's  an  apostleship  which  de- 
mands entire  consecration." 

"An  apostleship  which  demands  entire  consecra- 
tion  "   The  words  lingered  in  my  mind.    They  set 

my  heart  a-glow.  They  restored  the  authority  of  those 
literary  ideals  which  I  had  begun  to  think  of  as  insig- 
nificant. 

If  Henry  Trafford  was  right  in  his  judgment  of 
my  gifts,  if  I  had  not  been  wholly  misled  by  those 


THE  LURE  225 

young  raptures  which  had  been  a  pillar  of  fire  to  me 
when  I  first  conceived  myself  a  writer,  what  right 
had  I  to  discard  my  vocation  on  any  other  call  from 
the  outside  world  ?  Could  I  serve  the  world  better 
than  by  sticking  to  my  task? 

I  could  find  plenty  of  authority  for  such  a  point  of 
view.  I  thought  of  Goethe,  calmly  developing  his 
genius  under  the  thunder  of  French  guns,  and  told 
myself  that  a  page  of  Faust  was  of  much  greater  value 
than  anything  that  Goethe  could  have  accomplished 
with  a  sword  and  gun.  Perhaps  Shakespeare  was 
confronted  with  the  same  dilemma.  In  an  age  when 
all  men  went  to  war,  he  stuck  to  his  job  of  writing 
plays,  and  if  he  hadn't  there  would  have  been  no  Ham- 
let and  Macbeth.  Very  likely  his  friends  didn't  un- 
derstand him,  probably  reproached  him  as  unpatriotic. 
Yet  he  had  done  far  more  to  feed  the  fires  of  patriot- 
ism, and  create  the  pride  and  love  of  England  with  his 
writings,  than  they  had  ever  done  upon  the  sea  or  bat- 
tlefield. O,  there  were  plenty  of  instances  that  could 
be  used  in  my  justification ;  wherever  one  turned  in  his- 
tory Trafford's  contention  that  he  who  gave  a  new 
thought  to  the  world  had  deserved  better  of  men  than 
if  he'd  given  his  life  in  reckless  sacrifice,  stood  jus- 
tified. 

As  I  have  said,  Trafford  did  not  mean  me  to  make 
this  deduction  from  his  words.  He  did  not  realise 
that  in  doing  his  utmost  to  make  literary  ideals  domi- 
nant in  my  mind,  he  was  turning  me  away  from  a  duty 
which  he  had  already  declared  imperative.  He  saw 
me  relinquishing  my  ambition  to  be  a  great  writer, 


226  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

and  to  prevent  that  disaster  he  used  all  his  power,  all 
the  authority  of  his  affection  for  me  and  of  his  be- 
lief in  my  future. 

It  was  all  part  of  the  Lure  that  beset  me.  When 
we  think  of  a  lure,  we  usually  think  of  it  as  appealing 
to  the  lowest  elements  of  a  man's  nature,  to  his  lusts, 
his  selfishness,  his  pride.  There  is  a  subtler  lure,  that 
appeals  through  a  man's  finer  instincts,  through  his 
very  sense  of  duty  to  himelf  and  others.  But  it  is  not 
less  a  Lure,  in  yielding  to  which  a  man  may  lose  his 
soul.  It  is  not  always  the  world  which  a  man  is  tempted 
to  accept  in  exchange  for  his  soul;  the  soul  may  be 
exchanged  quite  as  fatally  for  a  reward  on  which  the 
world  sets  no  value. 


Was  it  not  indeed  true  that  my  soul  was  in  peril? 
Could  peril  to  the  soul  lurk  in  pure  love  and  pure 
ambition  ? 

I  tried  to  face  the  question,  but  it  was  with  averted 
eyes.  It  seemed  to  me  at  times  as  though  I  sailed  on 
an  enchanted  sea.  The  sails  hung  against  the  mast; 
no  wind  blew  from  any  quarter,  and  even  the  tides  were 
asleep.  I  was  a  man  bewitched,  incapable  of  motion, 
yet  conscious  that  a  single  manly  thought  would  break 
the  spell.  But  that,  thought  did  not  come.  In  vain  I 
endeavoured  to  evoke  it;  the  fountains  of  my  spirit 
were  sealed  and  silent. 

Mirage  lay  all  around  me.  Out  of  the  bewitched 
sea  rose  palms  and  green  islands — the  veritable  islands 


THE  LURE  227 

of  the  blessed.  Voices  of  soft  music  travelled  from 
them,  thrilling  me  with  the  promise  of  an  exquisite 
happiness.  Yet  I  knew  the  vision  unreal.  Death  and 
eternity  loomed  through  it,  like  pale  spectres.  They 
glared  an  instant,  monitory  and  menacing,  and  disap- 
peared. Beyond  the  rosy  haze  of  my  bewitchment 
they  gleamed  like  snowpeaks,  stern  and  pure;  but  they 
also  seemed  unreal. 

Trafford  appeared  to  have  failed  me;  from  Her- 
ridge,  Croxon,  and  their  kind  no  help  could  be  ex- 
pected. For  them  mirage  was  real,  and  they  walked 
contented  in  a  vain  show.  From  one  person  only, 
Mary  Lorimer,  could  I  expect  genuine  help,  and  her 
I  dared  not  seek. 

She  made  efforts  to  reach  me.  She  showed  me  her 
brother's  letters,  poor  fragmentary  messages  written 
with  a  blunt  pencil  on  thin  grey  paper,  full  of  boyish 
heroism  and  enthusiasm.  It  was  clear  that  Charles 
Lorimer  had  found  himself.  He  was  more  than  con- 
tent with  his  lot:  he  was  proud  to  be  where  he  was 
and  what  he  was.  She  put  on  my  desk  cuttings  from 
newspapers,  sometimes  an  episode  of  valour,  somC' 
times  a  poem  which  had  the  distinction  of  sincerit]^ 
and  pathos. 

One  night,  as  I  was  writing  late,  she  came  to  me. 

*T  have  news,"  she  said.  "I'm  going  to  France  next 
week.     I  expect  to  help  in  a  French  hospital." 

"Does  your  mother  know?"  I  asked. 

"I  shall  tell  her  to-morrow.  I  wanted  you  to  know 
first." 

"What  will  Grace  say?" 


228  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Grace  won't  mind  when  once  the  parting  is  over. 
She  can  manage  without  me." 

"I  congratulate  you  that  you  have  your  wish,  Mary." 

"What  about  yourself?"  she  said  abruptly. 

"I  suppose  I  shall  go  sometime." 

"Sometime!  I  begin  to  doubt  your  sometime.  I 
begin  to  wonder  if  you  will  ever  go." 

"You've  no  right  to  say  that,  Mary." 

"Haven't  I  ?"  she  said,  her  voice  vibrating  with  those 
hoarse  sweet  notes  which  it  always  had  when  she  was 
deeply  moved. 

And  then,  to  my  amazement  and  distress,  she  fell 
on  her  knees  beside  my  chair,  and  took  my  hand  and 
held  it  to  her  lips. 

"I  know  you  don't  love  me,  but  I  love  you,"  she  said. 
"If  I  didn't  know  you  cared  nothing  for  me,  I  shouldn't 
dare  to  speak  to  you  of  love." 

"Mary,  please  don't " 

'•Yes,  let  me  speak,  for  once;  it  will  be  the  first  and 
last  time.  Think  of  it  as  the  one  kindness  I  shall  ever 
ask  of  you.  We  women  whom  men  will  never  love  may 
at  least  claim  this  one  poor  privilege  of  loving  once 
in  a  lifetime,  and  not  being  ashamed  to  say  so." 

"I  thought  you  disliked  me,  Mary." 

"I  don't  wonder,"  she  said  humbly.  "I  did  behave 
badly  to  you  once,  but  can't  you  see  that  I  shouldn't 
have  been  interested  enough  in  you  to  dislike  you, 
unless  my  interest  was  capable  of  being  more  than 
liking?  And  I  shouldn't  speak  of  love  now,  if  I  didn't 
know  that  it's  not  at  all  what  passes  for  love  between 
men  and  women.    I  think  I  love  you  more  purely  than 


THE  LURE  229 

any  one  else  can,  just  because  I  know  that  I've  nothing 
to  gain  by  loving  you,  and  never  can  gain  what  all 
women  covet  most,  to  be  loved  in  return.  No,  I've 
nothing  to  gain  but  your  scorn.  You'll  scorn  me  after 
to-night;  I  know  that.  You'll  scorn  my  immodesty 
and  boldness.  You'll  say,  'There  was  a  woman  called 
Mary  Lorimer,  who  once  made  love  to  me,  and  wanted 
to  marry  me.'  So  I  would :  I'm  not  ashamed  to  say 
it.  If  you  were  a  beggar  I'd  gladly  take  the  road 
with  you,  and  beg  and  work  for  you.  You'll  never 
find  a  woman  in  the  world  who  can  give  you  a  devo- 
tion such  as  I  could  give.  But  I  know  that  this  is  vain 
talk.  And  if  you  were  suddenly  to  say,  'I'll  marry 
you,'  I  wouldn't  have  you,  because  I  know  you've 
nothing  that  you  can  give  me  in  return  for  what  I 
would  give  you.  So,  at  least,  I've  this  excuse,  haven't 
I — I'm  disinterested?  I'm  not  asking  anything  for 
myself,  but  O,  I  do  ask  something  for  you.  I  want 
you  to  be  worthy  of  yourself.  What  I  really  love  in 
you  is  a  nobility  I've  never  yet  found  in  any  man. 
There's  no  shame  in  loving  that,  is  there?  I  want  to 
go  on  loving  that,  and  I  want  to  be  sure  that  it  will 
never  fail  me." 

"You  think  poorly  of  me  indeed,  if  you  think  I'd 
scorn  you  for  what  you've  told  me,  Mary." 

"Well,  perhaps  it's  not  so  much  your  scorn  as  your 
forgetfulness  I  fear,"  she  said,  with  a  sad  smile. 

"My  forgetfulness  of  you,  Mary?" 

"O  no,  that  doesn't  matter.  In  a  few  days  I  shall 
have  gone  away,  and  it's  not  likely  we  shall  ever  meet 
again.    It's  woman's  lot  to  be  forgotten,  at  least  women 


230  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

such  as  I  am.  But  it's  forgetfulness  of  your  own  best 
ideals.  I'm  not  blind,  and  I  know  you're  being  tempted 
to  forget  Don't  yield,  please  don't.  Let  me  go  on 
thinking  of  you  as  I  know  you  really  are,  true  and 
brave  and  fine.  My  life  will  be  lonely,  but  it  will  be 
less  lonely  if  I  can  think  of  you  in  this  way.  If  you 
fail,  I  think  I  should  fail  too." 

She  rose  from  her  knees,  still  holding  my  hand. 

"Will  you  kiss  me,  just  once,  dear?"  she  said.  **  We 
shall  not  meet  again,  except  in  public.  Forgive  me  for 
saying  what  I  have.  It's  the  kind  of  confidence  one 
makes  only  once  in  a  lifetime:  I  think  it  is  usually 
made  only  by  the  dying.  Well,  after  to-night  Mary 
Lorimer  is  dead  to  you,  and  your  kiss  is  the  kiss  of 
eternal  farewell." 

I  kissed  her  brow. 

"No,"  she  said,  "the  lips.    For  once." 

She  went  softly  from  the  room,  without  a  single 
backward  glance,  with  my  unpassionate  kiss  upon  her 
lips. 

Here  was  something  more  than  mirage.  Through 
Mary  Lorimer  there  had  come  to  me  once  more  a  vi- 
sion of  reality.  Her  nobleness  stood  revealed,  and  I 
was  humbled  before  it.  I  saw  her  life  in  its  long  self- 
denial,  so  different  from  the  lives  of — well,  why  should 
I  not  say  it,  so  different  from  the  life  of  Alice.  For 
Mary  life  had  no  gaieties;  only  stern  loneliness,  au- 
sterity, absence  of  hopes  and  pleasures,  yet  beneath  all 
the  deep  fires  of  passion.  She  was  of  heroic  fibre. 
What  a  wife  she  would  make  to  a  soldier,  what  a 
mother  of  heroes!    I  saw  her  going  out  to  her  dread- 


THE  LURE  231 

ful  tasks  in  the  tragic  hospitals  in  France,  to  Hve  and 
breathe  and  work  among  the  most  repulsive  deforma- 
tions of  humanity,  yet  content  and  cheerful.  From 
men  she  asked  no  love,  only  the  opportunity  for  serv- 
ice. Her  confession  to  me  was  made  that  she  might 
serve  me.  Her  love  for  me  was  adoration  of  what 
she  thought  she  saw  in  me — God  knows  how  little  of 
it  I  could  see — a  potential  nobleness  that  responded 
to  her  own  proved  nobleness.  And  I  could  not  but 
recollect  how  Alice  had  declared  that  she  couldn't  bear 
to  love  a  man  who  left  her  to  go  to  the  wars,  that 
what  she  expected  in  love  was  an  absolute  surrender 
of  every  larger  aim  to  the  claim  of  personal  passion. 
I  sought  on  more  than  one  occasion  to  make  my 
deeper  thoughts  clear  to  Alice,  but  she  gave  me  no 
opportunity.  There  was  something  delicately  precari- 
ous in  our  relations,  which  was  in  itself  an  element  of 
delight,  and  we  both  feared  to  disturb  it.  The  spirit 
of  New  York  had  infected  her.  As  long  as  the  day 
brought  pleasure  she  gave  little  thought  to  anything 
that  lay  beyond  it.  I  was  her  friend,  her  comrade,  her 
lover,  but  she  willed  it  that  I  should  play  the  part  of 
friend  and  comrade  constantly,  of  the  lover  seldom. 
Now  and  again,  as  on  that  night  at  Pierrot's  play,  she 
let  me  catch  a  glimpse  of  her  soul.  For  an  instant  I 
saw  her  capable  of  passion,  but  for  an  instant  only. 
She  met  me  next  day  with  the  frank  air  of  a  pleased 
child,  eager  for  pleasure,  and  expecting  from  me  noth- 
ing more  than  a  willingness  to  contrive  pleasures  for 
her,  and  to  share  them. 


232  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"O,  Alice,"  I  said  once,  "won't  you  let  me  speak 
seriously  of  the  things  that  are  in  my  heart?" 

"Why  you've  told  me  lots  of  things  that  were  in 
your  heart,  Garedi,  or  you've  said  you  Have.  Weren't 
you  serious?" 

"But  I  want  you  to  be  serious.  When  you  call  me 
Gareth  I  feel  as  if  we're  play-acting." 

"Well,  you  helped  invent  the  play,  didn't  you?  And 
I  thought  it  pleased  you  to  remember  it." 

"So  it  does,  but " 

"But  you'd  like  to  drop  it?  Well,  I  wouldn't.  It's 
the  only  touch  of  romance  I've  had  in  a  life  much 
subdued  by  Tabrahamisms.  And  why  should  we  want 
to  be  serious?  Aren't  we  happy  as  we  are?  Why 
spoil  things?" 

And  because  I  feared  to  spoil  things  I  was  silent. 
This  delicate  relationship  was  so  easily  spoiled.  It 
was  clear  that  if  ever  I  spoke  to  her  the  words  of  love 
which  were  as  earnest  as  life  and  death,  she  would 
choose  the  hour ;  I  could  not.  She  had  an  infinite  skill 
in  postponing  it;  she  had  brought  to  perfection  wom- 
an's art  of  evasion;  she  found  a  subtle  pleasure  in 
skirting  the  edges  of  decision.  And  in  the  meantime 
she  offered  me  the  frankest  intimacy,  displayed  the  best 
and  worst  of  herself  without  reserve,  trusted  me,  and 
was  at  no  pains  to  conceal  her  fondness  for  me. 

So  the  mirage  closed  round  me  once  more,  and  I 
was  content  to  drift  on  the  enchanted  sea.  The  hour 
was  to  come  when  the  mirage  was  to  melt  forever, 
and  we  were  to  be  brought  face  to  face  with  unap- 
peasable reality.    That  hour  was  nearer  than  we  knew. 


CHAPTER  VI 
THE  HOUR 


In  the  end  of  April  I  finished  my  book,  and  placed 
the  last  instalment  in  the  hands  of  Herridge.  On  the 
morning  when  I  took  my  manuscript  to  the  office  the 
death  of  John  Grandison  was  reported  in  the  papers. 

I  found  Herridge  more  affected  than  I  had  thought 
it  possible  for  him  to  be. 

*'Yes,  he's  gone,"  he  said.  "He  was  one  of  the  best. 
I  think  he  had  it  in  him  to  do  much  better  work  than 
he'd  done.     You  didn't  know  him,  did  you?" 

"I  met  him  once  only,  and  liked  him.  I  liked  the 
outdoor  look  of  the  man,  and  his  outdoor  ways.  He 
impressed  me  with  a  manliness  which  isn't  very  evident 
in  his  books." 

"No,  that's  true.  Some  men  exceed  themselves  in 
their  books :  their  books  are  bigger  than  they  are. 
There  are  other  men  who  never  express  their  real  per- 
sonality in  their  books ;  they're  bigger  than  their  books. 
Grandison  was  that  kind  of  a  man." 

"What  did  he  die  of?  The  papers  don't  tell  us 
much." 

"Of  moral  fatigue,  I  think;  of  shock,  of  horror.    He 

wasn't  the  sort  of  man  who  could  look  on  war  as  an 

233 


234  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

adventure;  he  was  too  sympathetic.  He  took  things 
to  heart  too  much.  Do  you  remember  his  account  of 
the  Germans  entering  Brussels?" 

1  did  remember  it,  for  it  was  one  of  the  most  vivid 
pieces  of  writing  which  the  war  had  produced. 

"Yes,  and  I  shall  never  forget  the  picture  he  drew — 
that  endless  field-grey  host,  rolling  on  for  three  days 
and  nights,  inevitable  as  fate,  and  the  horrible  flight  of 
the  poor  people,  driven  before  it  like  sheep  to  the 
slaughter.  There  was  something  intense  in  every 
phrase,  something  that  stung  and  burned " 

"That  was  what  killed  him,"  said  Herridge — "the 
intensity  of  his  emotion.  He  poured  his  life  out  as  he 
wrote.  Then  he  comes  back  to  England  and  goes  to 
some  friends  of  his  in  Derbyshire,  and  they  think  how 
well  he  is  looking,  and  don't  know  that  there  is  an 
arrow  sticking  in  his  heart.  One  day  he  goes  for 
a  walk  among  the  hills,  taking  his  dogs  with  him — 
you  remember  how  he  loved  dogs? — and  he's  never 
seen  alive  again.  The  dogs  come  back  in  the  after- 
noon, and  then  his  friends  begin  to  think  something 
is  amiss,  and  set  out  to  find  him.  They  find  him  lying 
quietly  with  his  arm  under  his  head  upon  the  heather. 
He  had  been  dead  some  hours.  They  call  it  heart- 
failure;  I  think  it  would  be  truer  to  call  it  broken- 
heartedness." 

"Perhaps  he  preferred  dying  so,  knowing  that  he'd 
done  something  worthy  and  fine  before  he  died." 

"I  don't  care  what  he  preferred,"  said  Herridge 
fiercely.  "A  good  writer  doesn't  belong  to  himself, 
he  belongs  to  the  world.    He'd  no  right  to  die.    Why, 


THE  HOUR  235 

man,  he  was  only  thirty-five.  He  was  just  at  the  be- 
ginning of  things.  He  never  ought  to  have  gone  as 
war-correspondent.  I  told  him  so.  God  forgive  me, 
the  very  last  time  I  saw  him  I  believe  I  quarrelled  with 
him." 

"I've  no  doubt  he  understood  why,  and  didn't  blame 
you." 

"O  yes,  he  understood  that  I  loved  him.  And  he 
took  it  beautifully.  That  makes  it  all  the  harder  to 
remember.  Well,  he's  gone,  a  good  man  lost  because 
he  would  insist  on  doing  something  for  which  he  was 
radically  unfit.  Let  it  be  a  warning  to  you.  Grandi- 
son  was  not  so  sensitive  as  you  are,  but  what  he  saw 
killed  him.  My  God,  when  and  where  is  this  waste 
going  to  stop!  Is  the  world  to  be  stripped  bare  of 
genius,  and  turned  out  naked  to  begin  all  over  again, 
with  no  better  capital  than  the  blunt  nerves  and  brutal 
strength  of  fighting  men  to  shape  its  future?  I  de- 
clare, I'm  almost  sick  of  being  alive.  What's  the  good 
of  being  a  man  of  genius,  as  Grandison  was,  if  you're 
also  a  generous-hearted  fool,  betrayed  by  your  emo- 
tions into  self-destruction?  I've  pinned  my  faith  to 
brains.  I've  believed  that  brains  ruled  the  world.  It 
seems  they  don't.  Blind  passions  are  stronger  than 
brains,  and  the  more  brains  a  man  has  the  bigger  fool 
he  is  capable  of  being." 

He  rose  and  went  to  the  window  where  he  looked 
out  on  the  slovenly  magnificence  of  New  York  in  si- 
lence. Presently  he  turned  round  and  said  in  his  ha- 
bitual voice,  "Well,  I  suppose  you  recognise  in  what 
position  Grandison's  death  leaves  you?    You've  taken 


236  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

his  place  with  the  Magazine,  and  you'll  have  to  go  on 
taking  it." 

\ou  mean r 

"I  mean  I  want  another  story  from  you.  You've 
done  well.    I  expect  you  to  do  much  better." 

"I'm  glad  you  think  I've  gone  well,  but  you  know- 
how  things  are  with  me.     I  can  promise  nothing  more 

at  present." 

"You  don't  mean  to  tell  me  that  you're  as  mad  as 
poor  Grandison?" 

"I  mean  that  I  promised  myself  that  when  this  story 
was  completed  I  would  hold  myself  free  to  enlist,  if 
the  call  came.  I  don't  say  the  call's  come.  But  I  am 
determined  to  be  free  from  any  literary  obligation  if 
and  when  it  comes.  I  thought  you  understood  this. 
I  tried  to  make  it  plain  to  you." 

"You  did.  But  now  there's  something  I  want  to 
make  plain  to  you.  The  Magazine  has  to  go  on,  war 
or  no  war.  I  want  your  help,  and  I  want  it  badly. 
If  you  can't  or  won't  help  me,  then  I  must  go  to 
England,  and  see  what  I  can  do  there." 

"You  told  me  you  were  going  to  England  in  any 
case." 

"I  know  I  did.  I've  gone  over  every  spring.  But  I 
don't  want  to  go  this  year,  if  I  can  avoid  it." 

"Do  you  think  the  risk  too  great?" 

"God  bless  you,  no.  There's  no  risk  whatever  for 
the  big  liners.  They're  running  on  schedule,  just  as 
if  there  wasn't  any  war.  The  Germans  may  be  fools 
and  brutes,  but  they  wouldn't  think  of  sinking  a  Cu- 
narder,  full  of  non-combatants,  half  of  them  Ameri- 


THE  HOUR  237 

cans.  No,  It's  not  that  I'm  thinking  of.  It's  simply  that 
I  don't  want  to  see  England  in  war-time.  I'm  not  sure 
how  far  I  sympathise  with  her,  for  one  thing,  and  that 
might  make  things  awkward  for  me.  For  another 
thing,  I  find  that  almost  all  the  younger  writers,  among 
whom  I  should  look  for  recruits,  are  gone  to  the  war. 
There  are  only  the  older  men  like  Wells  and  Bennett 
and  Galsworthy,  and  I  don't  want  any  of  them.  I'd 
like  Locke,  for  he's  charming,  but  he's  booked  already 
on  a  five-year-contract.  I  might  try  some  of  the 
women,  it's  true ;  but  they  all  want  to  write  war-novels, 
and  God  save  me  from  a  woman's  war-novel.  Faked 
up  newspaper  stuff,  plus  sloppy  sentiment — what  else 
can  they  produce  ?  No,  I  don't  want  them  either.  But 
I  do  want  you,  and  I  think  I've  some  claim  on  you. 
Have  I  made  myself  clear?" 

"Quite  clear;  but  my  dear  Herridge,  I  can't  do  it. 
I've  been  proud  to  write  for  you,  and  when  the  war's 
over  I'll  be  proud  to  go  on  writing  for  you.  But  I 
couldn't  tackle  another  novel  in  my  present  state  of 
mind.  Even  if  I  don't  enlist,  I  couldn't.  It's  been  tre- 
mendous work  to  write  this  one.  It's  been  like  writ- 
ing in  a  thunder-storm,  when  you  want  to  jump  up 
every  minute  and  see  whether  the  last  bolt  of  light- 
ning hit  anything.  I  can't  concentrate  my  mind  on 
creating  drama  when  the  whole  world's  a  tragedy.  I 
feel  as  if  my  work  is  unspeakably  petty,  and  I'm 
ashamed  of  it." 

"Well,  I'm  not  ashamed  of  it,  and  you've  no  need 
to  be.  You're  too  emotional.  Your  nerves  are  a  bit 
shaken.    I'll  give  you  the  same  advice  I  gave  you  once 


238  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

before — go  away  into  some  quiet  place  and  forget  the 
war.   Get  away  from  New  York  and  the  newspapers.'" 

"I'm  sorry,  Herridge,  but  it  can't  be  done.  Don't 
think  I  woukhi't  Hke  to.  I'd  give  a  great  deal  to  have 
the  kind  of  mind  that  can  draw  its  blinds  and  close  its 
doors  against  the  outside  world." 

"You'd  get  it,  if  you'd  only  exercise  it.     It's  just  a 

matter  of  will." 

"I  wish  it  were,  but  I  assure  you  it  isn't.  I've  the 
best  will  in  the  world  to  write  books,  and  do  nothing 

else ;  but  there's  something  stronger  than  my  will  that 

won't  let  me." 

"Well,  if  you  can't,  you  can't,"  he  said  wearily. 
"You're  as  big  a  fool  as  Grandison,  but  I  suppose  it's 
the  way  God  made  you.  And  I'm  not  going  to  quarrel 
with  you  about  it,  as  I  did  with  Grandison.  I  don't 
want  to  add  to  my  stock  of  bitter  memories." 

"Ask  me  in  a  year's  time,  and  I'll  be  proud  to  serve 
you,  Herridge." 

"A  year's  time !  Good  God,  we  may  all  be  dead. 
No,  I  won't  'proticipate'  as  Mrs.  Gamp  puts  it,"  he  con- 
cluded with  a  dreary  smile. 

"In  a  year  the  war  will  be  over,  and  we'll  all  have  got 
back  to  normal." 

"Shall  we?  Well,  I'm  not  so  sure  of  it.  I've  proph- 
esied the  end  of  the  damned  thing  too  many  times  to 
have  much  faith  in  my  own  prophecies,  or  anybody 
else's.  However,  the  Magazine's  got  to  go  on,  what- 
ever happens,  and  so  I  suppose  it's  the  Lusitania  for 


me. 


"Then  you  will  go  to  England?" 


THE  HOUR  239 

**I  suppose  so.  I've  no  choice.  I  hate  going.  But 
if  you  won't  help  me  I  must  find  some  one  who  will, 
and  there's  no  one  here  I  want.  If  the  worst  comes 
to  the  worst  I  daresay  I  can  get  Bennett." 

"When  do  you  think  of  going?" 

"Next  week,  probably.  And  look  here,  just  to  show 
I  don't  bear  any  malice,  we'll  have  a  farewell  dinner 
before  I  go.  I'll  let  you  know  the  night.  You'll  come, 
won't  you?" 

"Of  course  I  will." 

"Very  good.  And  please  don't  come  to  see  me  in 
the  meantime.  I'm  sore  over  this  business,  sorer  than 
you  think.  By  the  time  the  Lusitania  sails,  I've  no 
doubt  I  shall  have  recovered  my  good-humour,  and 
there  shan't  be  any  moaning  of  the  bar  when  I  put  out 
to  sea,  I  promise  you." 

n 

Croxon  also  was  to  sail  on  the  Lusitania.  He  was 
looking  forward  to  the  voyage  as  a  relief  from  the 
great  pressure  of  business  which  he  had  endured  in 
New  York. 

"There's  no  tonic  like  the  sea,"  he  said  cheerfully. 
"I  feel  as  though  I'd  grown  years  younger  when  I've 
been  at  sea  for  a  couple  of  days.  My  only  trouble  is 
that  I  must  leave  Alice  behind." 

"You're  not  taking  her,  then?" 

"I  can't.  It's  not  the  risk,  for  I  don't  believe  there 
is  any.  But  I  have  to  travel  as  fast  as  I  can,  see  men 
in  London  and  Paris,  and  get  back  within  a  month,  if 


240  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

I  can.  Of  course  she's  very  unhappy  about  it,  poor 
child.  And  I'm  unhappy  too,  for  I  don't  know  what 
to  do  with  her.  Have  you  come  to  an  understanding 
with  her  yet?" 

"I've  come  as  near  as  she  will  let  me.  She  knows 
I  love  her." 

"I  don't  understand  your  modern  ways  of  love-mak- 
ing," he  said  with  a  grim  smile.  "When  I  met  my 
wife  I  knew  what  I  wanted  within  a  week,  and  she 
knew  it  too.  You  and  Alice  have  been  pretty  much 
together  for  four  months.  I've  given  you  every 
chance.     What's  the  matter  with  the  pair  of  you?" 

I  knew  what  was  the  matter,  but  I  couldn't  tell 
him.  Alice  was  drinking  her  full  first  draught  of  lib- 
erty, and  was  intoxicated  by  it.  I  could  quite  under- 
stand that  Croxon's  mode  of  wooing  would  be  brief 
and  impetuous.  His  great  strength  and  bulk  suggested 
the  cave-man,  who  got  a  wife  by  capture.  But  such 
methods  were  impossible  for  me,  still  less  practicable 
with  Alice.  How  often  had  I  wished  I  could  seize 
her,  carry  her  off,  compel  her,  put  an  end  to  uncer- 
tainty by  one  masterful  act;  but  I  knew  that  in  forcing 
love  I  should  kill  love.  More  and  more  I  had  dis- 
covered the  strange  complications  of  her  nature,  her 
simplicity  and  her  strength,  her  elusiveness,  her  sud- 
den yieldings  to  emotion  and  her  swift  retreats,  her 
adorable  childishness  and  that  hard  core  of  common- 
sense  which  she  called  her  "worldliness."  And  so  to 
Croxon's  question  no  reply  was  possible  save  one  that 
might  have  sounded  like  an  accusation  of  Alice,  and 
that  I  could  not  give. 


THE  HOUR  241 

"I  can  only  ask  for  time,"  I  said,  "If  you  will  give 
me  time,  I'm  quite  sure  that  things  will  come  out  all 
right  between  us." 

"I've  given  you  time,"  he  said.  "How  much  more 
do  you  want?  I  see  I've  got  to  put  the  matter  very 
bluntly  to  you.  I'm  going  away,  and  I  can't  leave 
AHce  in  New  York.  That  wouldn't  do  on  any  ground. 
Even  if  you  were  engaged  to  her,  it  wouldn't  do.  It 
seems  to  me  that  I'll  have  to  send  her  back  to  the 
Vernons  at  Fruitvale  and  I  don't  believe  she'll  want 
to  go." 

"Is  there  no  one  she  could  stay  with  in  New  York, 
while  you're  away?" 

"It's  a  queer  thing,  but  there  isn't.  I  know  lots  of 
men,  but  no  women.  I  suppose  I  could  buy  some  one 
to  be  her  chaperone,  but  I'd  pity  the  chaperone." 

The  idea  of  buying  a  chaperone  was  so  naive  that 
I  laughed  and  Croxon  laughed  too. 

"Alice  might  kill  her,  I  admit,"  he  said. 

At  that  moment  Alice  entered  the  room.  She  was 
dressed  in  a  spring  costume,  with  a  bunch  of  violets 
at  her  breast,  and  looked  astonishingly  fresh  and 
bright. 

"Who  was  I  going  to  kill?"  she  said  demurely. 

"We  were  discussing  what  to  do  with  you  while 
I'm  away,"  said  her  father. 

Her  face  clouded. 

"Why  can't  I  come  with  you,  father?  I  think  it 
most  unkind  of  you  not  to  take  me.  You've  always 
promised  to  take  me  to  Paris,  and  now  when  you  could 
take  me,  you  won't." 


242  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I've  told  you  a  good  many  times,  my  dear,"  said 
Croxon,  "Paris  is  dead  and  dark.  It's  no  place  for 
you." 

"It's  no  more  dangerous  for  me  than  you,  father." 

"I  didn't  say  it  was  dangerous.  But  they  don't  want 
women  there,  except  the  kind  of  women  who  can  work 
in  hospitals.  You've  no  idea  what  war  has  meant  to 
Paris." 

"O,  how  I  hate  the  war!"  she  said  bitterly.  "Al- 
ways tlie  war.  People  talk  of  nothing  else.  And  it 
isn't  our  war,  after  all." 

"It's  everybody's  war,  because  it  affects  everybody, 
my  child.  Don't  you  understand?  You  can't  go  on 
doing  the  same  kind  of  things  you've  always  done,  as 
if  no  war  existed." 

"I  don't  see  that  it's  made  much  difference  to  you, 
father,  except  that  it's  made  you  richer.  You  told  me 
that,  you  know." 

"Yes,  it's  brought  me  business,  and  that's  the  very 
reason  why  I  have  to  go  to  Paris." 

"Father,  dear,  don't  go.  I  know  I'm  selfish,  I 
don't  want  you  to  go,  if  I  can't  go.  But  there's  an- 
other reason  too;  though  you  won't  say  so,  I  know  it's 
dangerous.  Aren't  you  rich  enough?  Can't  you  be 
content  to  stay  in  New  York  with  me?  You  don't 
know  how  miserable  I  shall  be  if  you  go.  It'll  be  worse 
than  those  times  when  you  left  me  at  Tabraham's.  I 
used  to  cry  my  heart  out  after  you  were  gone.  It'll 
be  much  worse  now,  because  I  shall  always  think  of 
you  as  being  in  peril." 


THE  HOUR  243 

"If  it's  so  perilous,  that's  another  good  reason  why 
you  can't  go,  my  dear." 

She  began  to  weep,  and  Croxon  drew  her  to  his 
breast,  and  put  his  arms  round  her. 

"Can't  my  little  girl  be  happy  without  me  for  one 
short  month?  That's  all  it  is.  And  I'll  take  you  the 
next  time.  I'll  make  a  holiday  on  purpose.  Yes,  I 
will.  I'll  try  to  get  out  of  business.  I've  all  the 
money  I  want,  and  God  knows  I'm  a  fool  for  wanting 
more.  I'll  buy  that  farm  I've  so  often  talked  of, 
Alice.  It  shall  be  near  New  York,  somewhere  up  the 
Hudson,  and  we'll  have  great  times  together.  There 
now,  don't  cry.  I'll  give  you  my  word  I'll  make  plans 
to  get  out  of  business  after  this  trip.  But  I  must  go 
this  trip,  and,  after  all,  I'll  be  back  again  in  a  month." 

"But  suppose  anything  happened  to  you,  father,  and 
you  didn't  come  back." 

"What  can  happen?  The  sea's  a  safer  place  than 
Fifth  Avenue." 

"They're  threatening  things,  father.  I  saw  it  in  the 
papers  this  morning.  They're  warning  people  not  to 
sail  upon  the  Lusitania." 

"I  wish  I  could  catch  the  liar  who  started  that  non- 
sense. I'd  break  his  neck  for  him.  Don't  you  know 
there  are  two  thousand  people  sailing  on  the  Lusita- 
nia? Do  you  think  they'd  go  if  they  thought  there 
was  any  danger  ?  Do  you  think  the  Government  would 
let  her  sail?  Of  course  they  wouldn't.  I'll  call  up 
the  office,  if  you  like,  and  you  shall  hear  what  they 
say.  I'll  wager  there  hasn't  been  a  berth  cancelled. 
Just  wait  a  moment,  and  I'll  see." 


244  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

He  went  to  the  'phone,  glad  of  an  excuse  to  break 
the  tension  of  the  situation,  and  returned  in  a  few 
minutes  with  a  smihng  face. 

"Not  a  berth  cancelled — that's  what  they  report. 
The  warnings  that  have  gone  round  they  believe  to 
be  the  wicked  work  of  either  a  practical  joker  or  of 
some  fool  German.    Now  are  you  satisfied,  my  dear?" 

"I'm  not  satisfied  to  be  left  behind,  father.  And 
besides,  what  are  you  going  to  do  with  me?" 

"How  about  Fruitvale,  and  ♦^he  Vernons?" 

"Three  thousand  miles  from  New  York!  And  that 
would  be  three  thousand  miles  further  away  from  you ! 
No,   indeed." 

"But  I  thought  you  loved  the  place." 

"So  I  do  in  summer,  but  it  isn't  summer.  It  can 
be  terribly  lonely  there  when  the  sky  is  grey,  and  the 
lake  in  f^ood.  And  more  tlian  that,  Vernon's  enlisted. 
Fancy  me  shut  up  in  a  little  house  on  a  mountain  side, 
with  Mrs.  Vernon — two  women  alone,  with  the  rain 
beating  on  the  roof,  and  the  woods  moaning,  and  the 
lake  roaring  on  the  beach.  I'd  die  of  melancholy. 
Fruitvale  is  the  loveliest  place  on  earth  when  you're 
happy,  but  I  can't  conceive  any  place  more  hateful  if 
you're  unhappy.  No,  father,  if  I  can't  go  with  you, 
I'm  going  to  stay  in  New  York.  If  I  can't  have  you 
to  look  after  me,  I  can  have  Gareth,  can't  I?" 

"So  you  do  appreciate  Gareth,  eh,  miss?  I  thought 
you  didn't." 

She  blushed  at  that,  and  Croxon  nodded  at  me,  with 
the  sly  joy  of  a  successful  diplomat.  I  could  see  what 
he  designed ;  in  another  moment  he  would  have  forced 


THE  HOUR  245 

us  together,  and  made  a  definition  of  our  feelings  for 
each  other  quite  inevitable.  From  such  a  contact  I 
recoiled,  for  I  had  reason  to  doubt  its  issue;  and  so, 
in  desperation,  I  interposed  with  a  new  suggestion. 

"Mr.  Croxon,"  I  said.  "Why  shouldn't  Alice  live 
with  the  Lorimers  at  Oakwood  till  you  come  back?  I 
intend  living  in  New  York  for  the  next  month  in  order 
to  see  my  book  through  the  press,  and  Alice  could 
have  my  rooms.  The  Lorimers  are  charming  people, 
and  I've  not  the  least  doubt  they'd  be  delighted  to  have 
Alice  with  them." 

"Who  are  the  Lorimers?"  he  asked  suspiciously. 

I  gave  him  a  brief  account  of  them,  incidentally 
painting  a  picture  of  the  beauty  of  Oakwood. 

"I  do  believe,"  I  concluded,  "that  Alice  would  be 
quite  happy  there.  And  if  you  don't  object,  I  could 
see  her  as  often  as  she'd  let  me,  and  give  her  a  good 
time  in  New  York  now  and  then.  You  said  you  wanted 
a  chaperone  for  Alice ;  well,  there's  Mrs.  Lorimer,  and 
there's  Grace  Lorimer  for  a  companion." 

"Well,  it  might  do,"  he  said  doubtfully.  "What 
do  you  say,  Alice?" 

"I  don't  much  care,"  she  said  sullenly.  "I  don't 
suppose  Mrs.  Lorimer  can  be  worse  than  Tabraham." 

"She  isn't  in  the  least  like  Tabraham,  I  assure  you, 
Alice.  She  doesn't  wear  the  wrong  hats  and  she 
doesn't  snuffle." 

This  drew  a  reluctant  smile  from  her,  and  a  loud 
laugh  from  her  father. 

"It  doesn't  seem  a  bad  scheme,"  he  said.  "Alice, 
my  dear,  you'll  do  a  good  deal  to  send  me  away  with 


246  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

an  easy  mind  if  you  would  consent  to  it.  Not  now, 
of  course.  I'll  make  some  further  enquiries.  Did 
you  say  there  were  two  daughters  in  the  home,  Wal- 
ler?" 

"There  were,  but  Mary  has  gone  to  France  as  a 
nurse.     There's  only  Grace  and  her  mother." 

"Very  good.  You  two  talk  it  over.  I  must  go 
now,  for  I've  a  dozen  things  to  see  to.  And  Alice, 
my  dear,  remember  what  I've  said.  I'll  make  this  my 
last  business  trip,  if  I  can.  Try  to  be  happy  without 
me  for  a  month,  and  I'll  do  all  I  can  to  make  you  happy 
when  I  come  back." 

He  kissed  her  tenderly  and  left  the  room. 


Ill 


In  spite  of  the  light  way  in  which  Croxon  had 
treated  the  threats  against  the  Lusitania,  I  was  more 
disturl)ed  than  I  cared  to  acknowledge.  Undoubtedly 
there  was  some  definite  source  from  which  these 
threats  emanated.  They  were  clearly  not  the  work  of 
some  irresponsible  scare-monger  or  practical  joker. 
They  were  concerted  and  detailed.  Warnings  had  been 
sent  through  the  mails  to  passengers  and  had  appeared 
in  the  press  to  the  effect  that  any  Americans  who 
travelled  on  the  Lusitania  did  so  at  their  own  risk. 

Was  there  a  real  plot  to  destroy  her?  It  seemed 
improbable  to  the  point  of  absurdity.  It  was  well 
known  that  she  carried  neither  arms  nor  munitions. 
The  thing  was  inconceivable. 


THE  HOUR  247 

On  my  way  out  to  Oakwood,  after  my  conversation 
with  Croxon,  I  caught  sight  of  HausHng  in  the  train — 
the  man  I  had  knocked  down  in  Herridge's  office.  He 
was  reading  a  German  paper,  and  there  was  a  pecuhar 
gloating  expression  on  his  heavy  face.  He  got  off  at 
the  station  before  Oakwood,  and  I  remembered  that 
a  good  many  Germans  Hved  there,  and  that  there  had 
been  a  rumour  of  a  wireless  apparatus  concealed  in  the 
woods.  As  the  train  moved  out  he  saw  me,  and  bared 
his  teeth  in  a  sort  of  ugly  snarl.  The  circumstance  in 
itself  was  insignificant,  but  somehow  I  connected  it 
with  the  threats  against  the  Lusitania.  There  was 
both  concealed  triumph  and  unconcealed  cruelty  in  the 
man's  gloating  expression. 

The  next  day  I  went  to  the  office  of  Henry  Trafford, 
on  matters  connected  with  the  publication  of  my  book, 
and  had  a  brief  conversation  with  him.  It  seemed  that 
a  member  of  his  firm  had  intended  sailing  on  the 
Lusitania,  but  had  cancelled  his  passage.  It  was  this 
circumstance  which  had  brought  Trafford  down  to  the 
office,  which  he  rarely  visited. 

"Do  you  think  there's  anything  serious  in  these 
threats  against  the  Lusitania?"  I  asked. 

*T  think  there  is,"  he  said  gravely.  "At  all  events 
Simons  does,  and  I  don't  care  to  send  him  to  Europe 
against  his  will." 

"Herridge  is  going,"  I  said.  "He  laughs  at  the 
threat  of  peril." 

"He  would.  He's  never  yet  comprehended  the  real 
nature  of  this  war,  and  doesn't  understand  the  German 
spirit." 


248  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"I  wish  you'd  tell  me  why  you  think  the  threat  se- 
rious.    To  me  it  seems  absurd." 

"Sit  down,"  he  said,  "and  I'll  tell  you.  The  whole 
trouble  with  Germany  lies  in  wrong  thinking.  If  you 
know  what  a  nation  thinks  you  can  predicate  its  ac- 
tions. I  suppose  you  imagine  that  Germany  would 
never  sink  a  great  passenger  vessel  in  cold  blood  be- 
cause Germany  is  a  Christian  nation,  and  is  at  least 
bound  by  the  traditions  of  Christian  chivalry.  Well, 
Germany  isn't  Christian,  and  therefore  isn't  chivalrous. 
She's  reverted  to  barbarism.  Such  religion  as  she 
has  isn't  Christian,  it's  barbaric.  Her  God  is  a  tribal 
God,  with  all  the  fierce  habits  of  the  tril^e.  You  know 
wdiat  her  teachers  have  had  to  say  about  Christianity. 
They've  accused  it  of  enervating  mankind  by  human- 
ity and  sympathy.  They've  denounced  it  as  a  religion 
for  slaves.  They've  parodied  and  profaned  the  be- 
atitudes of  Jesus,  and  have  said,  'Ye  have  heard  men 
say,  Blessed  are  the  peace-makers,  but  I  say.  Blessed 
are  the  war-makers,  the  children  of  Odin,  who  is 
greater  than  Jehovah.'  You  might  as  well  expect 
tenderness  from  wolves  as  pity  or  magnanimity  from 
people  who  think  in  this  way." 

"But  to  attack  and  sink  a  great  unarmed  liner  is 
against  international  law,  isn't  it?" 

"My  dear  boy,  there  is  no  international  law  where 
Germany  is  concerned.  What  do  pirates  care  for  in- 
ternational law?  What  did  the  Kaiser  care  for  the 
traditions  of  honourable  battle  when  he  said  to  his 
troops,  'When  you  meet  the  foe  you  will  defeat  him. 
No  quarter  will  be  given,  no  prisoners  taken.     Let 


THE  HOUR  249 

all  who  fall  into  your  hands  be  at  your  mercy.  Gain 
a  reputation  like  the  Huns  under  Attila.'  He  said  that 
in  1900 — fifteen  years  ago.  He's  bared  his  fangs 
since  and  is  a-drip  with  blood.  The  viler  the  atrocity 
he  can  commit,  the  more  lustful  is  he  to  commit  it. 
And  he's  infected  his  whole  nation  with  the  same  fear- 
ful blood-lust.  Don't  think  for  a  moment  the  figment 
of  international  law  will  ever  stop  the  German  from 
gratifying  his  appetite  for  cruelty — it  would  be  like 
offering  legal  arguments  to  a  tiger." 
'  *'You  really  believe  that?" 

"I  don't  believe,  I  know.  Germany's  already  out- 
lawed. She's  a  pirate.  She's  bound  by  no  conven- 
tions, least  of  all  those  of  chivalry  and  honour,  which 
she  has  openly  repudiated.  Alas,  that  I  should  say  it, 
for  there  was  a  Germany  I  knew  in  my  youth  which 
was  modest,  humane,  pious — the  Germany  of  to-day 
is  insane,  and  has  all  the  degenerate  passions  of  a 
vicious  madman.  I've  come  to  see  that.  America 
doesn't  see  it  yet.  But  she  will  see  it  sooner  or  later, 
and  when  she  does  she'll  have  to  fight  Germany  to 
save  her  own  life  from  destruction." 

I  had  never  heard  Trafford  speak  so  strongly  be- 
fore. There  came  back  to  my  memory  the  words  he 
had  spoken  months  earlier — "The  war  will  attract  all 
the  haters  of  freedom  on  the  one  side,  and  all  the  lov- 
ers of  freedom  on  the  other,"  Since  then  he  had 
talked  little  about  the  war,  except  in  generalities;  it 
was  all  the  more  surprising  therefore  to  witness  this 
strength  of  passionate  indignation  in  him.     He  spoke 


250  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

as  a  prophet,  and  his  worn  face  glowed  with  pro- 
phetic fire. 

"I  see  you're  incredulous,"  he  continued.  "So  have 
I  been  till  incredulity  was  no  longer  possible.  I  never 
thought  the  Kaiser  serious  when  he  told  his  troops  to 
imitate  the  Huns.  I  thought  it  mere  gasconade, 
though  of  a  very  perilous  quality.  I  see  now  that  he 
really  meant  what  he  said.  Think  of  what  he  did  at 
Louvain.  Think  of  the  deliberately  planned  outrages 
on  women;  not  the  occasional  excesses  of  a  drunken 
soldiery,  but  outrages  deliberately  planned  and  exe- 
cuted with  a  deadly  thoroughness.  Think  of  his  use 
of  poisonous  gas — something  never  heard  of  in  mod- 
ern warfare.  There's  such  a  thing  as  clean  fighting, 
and  there's  such  a  thing  as  foul  fighting.  Germany 
has  fought  foul,  and  has  done  so  by  choice.  Do  you 
suppose  the  Kaiser  and  his  ruffians  would  hesitate  for 
an  instant  to  send  a  great  liner  crowded  with  non- 
combatants  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea  if  they  get  the 
chance?  What  would  restrain  them?  Honour 
wouldn't.  Humanity  and  magnanimity  wouldn't,  for 
they  have  neither.  I  tell  you  the  more  infamous  a  deed 
is  the  more  they  will  be  eager  to  commit  it,  and  the 
more  detestable  it  may  appear  to  civilisation  the  more 
desirous  they  will  be  to  affront  and  defy  civilisation." 

"Fear  and  commonsense  might  restrain  them  surely. 
They  wouldn't  dare  to  challenge  America." 

"Diplomats  wouldn't,  but  Germany  has  no  diplo- 
mats. She  has  only  armed  brutes  to  guide  her.  There's 
not  a  sane  mind  left  in  her  councils.  She's  gambling 
to  win  the  world.     She's  lost  the  first  throw,  and  is 


THE  HOUR  251 

maddened  by  her  loss.  All  she  can  think  of  is  to 
double  her  stakes,  and  go  on  doubling  them  till  she  is 
bankrupt." 

"But  this  folly,  if  she  really  purposes  it,  would  be 
too  egregious." 

'"Well,  I  still  have  a  faint  hope  that  she  may  realise 
it;  but  I  can  find  no  reason  for  my  hope.  H  she  were 
only  mad  she  might  be  saved;  but  she's  stupid,  and 
stupidity  is  incurable.  All  I  can  say  is,  if  you've  any 
influence  over  Herridge  or  any  other  of  your  friends 
who  intend  sailing  on  the  Ltisitania,  persuade  them 
not  to  go.  I  think  you  know  I'm  not  a  coward.  If  I 
had  to  go  to  England, — I  mean  if  it  was  an  inevitable 
duty — why,  I'd  go,  and  take  my  chance.  But  for  a 
man  to  go  just  because  he's  always  gone  at  this  time 
of  the  year,  assuming  that  the  war  hasn't  altered  any- 
thing, is  foolishness.  But  I'm  afraid  that  attitude  of 
mind  is  typical.  America  isn't  awake  to  the  peril  that 
menaces  her  and  the  whole  world,  and  she  won't  wake 
until  some  great  disaster  overtakes  her." 

I  came  away  from  this  talk  with  Trafford  with  a 
mind  divided.  I  was  so  much  impressed  by  it  that  I 
went  to  the  Cunard  office  at  Bowling  Green,  and  asked 
for  information.  They  were  aware  of  these  strange 
warnings  which  had  gone  abroad;  did  they  attach  any 
importance  to  them  ?  A  polite  gentleman  in  spectacles 
was  assiduous  to  reassure  me.  He  informed  me  that  it 
was  the  proud  boast  of  the  Cunard  Company  that  they 
had  never  lost  a  ship.  Was  it  likely  that  they  would 
permit  the  Lusitania  to  sail  if  there  was  the  least  dan- 
ger?    He  spoke  of  the  reputation  of  the  Company  as 


252  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

though  it  were  a  woman's  chastity,  a  thing-  too  sacred 
to  be  impugned.  He  was  shocked  at  the  mere  sugges- 
tion that  anything  would  happen  to  the  Lusitania. 

"But  I  hear  some  berths  have  been  cancelled,"  I  said. 

"That  always  happens,"  he  replied.  "But  I  assure 
you  that  there  are  not  more  than  usual.  Let  me  show 
you  the  shipping  list." 

He  opened  a  thick  volume,  and  pushed  it  towards 
me. 

"You  see  for  yourself,  sir,"  he  said,  "we  are  ab- 
solutely full." 

I  thanked  him  for  his  courtesy,  which  he  acknowl- 
edged with  studied  indifference.  I  believe  he  was  gen- 
uinely hurt  that  I  had  for  an  instant  doubted  that  a 
Cunarder  could  fail  by  any  human  circumstance  to 
make  her  port  on  time. 

Yet  I  was  not  wholly  convinced.  As  I  left  the  office 
I  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  grey  sea  and  shuddered.  A 
hundred  yards  away  I  saw  the  White  Star  Office,  and 
there  came  to  me  the  memory  of  the  Titanic.  She 
also  had  sailed  out  in  all  her  proud  greatness,  and  had 
disappeared.  There  was  something  ominous  in  the 
memory:  ominous  and  profoundly  disturbing. 


IV 


Two  experiences  are  vivid  in  my  mind  as  I  recall 
the  days  that  followed.  The  one  is  the  extraordinary 
tenderness  of  Croxon.  Every  moment  that  he  could 
spare  from  his  own  business  affairs  he  gave  to  Alice. 


THE  HOUR  253 

She  had  once  complained  that  Croxon  seemed  some- 
times to  have  forgotten  that  she  was  his  daughter;  but 
in  these  days  he  appeared  to  remember  Httle  else.  He 
sought  to  please  her  with  tireless  assiduity.  He  sur- 
prised her  every  day  with  costly  presents.  He  even 
took  her  with  him  on  his  daily  excursions  into  the 
business  quarters  of  New  York.  He  was  reluctant 
to  have  her  out  of  his  sight. 

In  one  of  his  moments  of  confidence  he  said  to  me: 
"I  feel  as  if  I've  not  acted  right  by  Alice,  though  I 
don't  see  how  I  could  have  acted  otherwise.  I  couldn't 
take  her  with  me  on  my  many  journeys,  could  I?  I 
had  to  leave  her  at  Tabraham's.  But  I  feel  now  how 
much  I've  lost  by  being  separated  from  her,  and  per- 
haps she  has  lost  something,  too.  I've  never  watched 
her  grow,  as  some  fathers  watch  their  children.  I 
envy  the  man  who  watches  the  minds  of  his  children 
opening,  and  notes  all  their  little  sayings,  and  their 
ideas  about  things.  My  wife  used  to  keep  a  little  book 
in  which  she  wrote  down  the  quaint  and  curious  things 
which  Alice  said  when  she  was  a  child.  I  guess  I've 
lost  that  book  long  ago.  I  wish  I  had  it.  She's  grown 
up  without  much  care  from  me.  But  I'll  make  it  up 
to  her,  somehow.  Let  me  get  this  journey  over,  and 
I'll  plan  a  different  kind  of  life,  and  see  if  I  can't 
be  a  decent  sort  of  father  to  her." 

This  idea  of  living  a  different  kind  of  life  on  his 
return  from  Paris  had  taken  a  strong  hold  upon  his 
mind. 

"I'm  getting  old,"  he  said,  "and  I  don't  seem  to  have 
got  much  out  of  life  after  all.    I've  been  too  busy  get- 


254  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

ting  a  living  to  live.  And  it  isn't  as  though  I  didn't 
know  better.  I'm  not  like  these  New  Yorkers;  I  don't 
want  the  things  they  want,  and  I  know  that  the  things 
they  get  wouldn't  satisfy  me.  I  don't  give  a  tinker's 
curse  for  society,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing.  It's  gar- 
nished emptiness.  I've  lived  under  wide  skies,  and 
know  somcdiing  of  the  bigness  of  the  world.  I  love 
the  West,  the  great  woods,  the  lonely  lakes,  the  prai- 
ries, the  mountains — the  freshness  of  it  all,  the  silence, 
the  immensity.  The  West  for  most  of  the  men  I  meet 
ends  at  Albany  or  Buffalo.  They'd  be  frightened  to 
death  if  they  had  to  sleep  under  the  stars,  with  the 
coyotes  howling  in  the  bush.  Their  idea  of  travel  is 
to  get  on  a  big  ship,  land  at  some  European  port,  and 
hide  themselves  at  once  in  a  hotel  which  is  as  like  as 
two  peas  to  the  hotel  they  left  on  Fifth  Avenue.  I'm 
not  built  that  way." 

He  wasn't;  he  was  a  good  deal  of  a  primitive  man, 
and  this  had  been  for  me  his  most  attractive  charac- 
teristic. I  knew  also,  better  than  he  did,  how  much  of 
this  kind  of  quality  he  had  bequeathed  to  his  daughter. 
I  had  seen  her  in  those  days  we  passed  at  Silver  Lakes 
and  Lost  Lode  Mine,  stripped  of  all  artificiality,  facing 
hardship  gallantly,  responding  with  alacrity  to  the  call 
of  the  wilderness.  It  was  on  this  quality  in  her  that 
I  based  my  hope.  I  felt  that  this  was  the  real  Alice, 
a  woman  of  authentic  passions,  of  natural  instincts, 
of  large  nature.  And  the  real  Croxon  wasn't  the  bat- 
tling speculator,  the  brigand  of  commerce,  the  wild 
dollar-hunter — these  were  excrescences  of  the  man; 


THE  HOUR  255 

the  real  core  of  the  man  was  sound  with  primitive 
strength  and  virtue. 

"I'll  have  to  look  at  this  Fruitvale  of  yours,  when 
I  come  back,"  he  said.  "I  think  I'd  like  to  go  there, 
and  do  something  on  a  big  scale.  Why  shouldn't  I 
buy  up  all  of  those  little  footling  ranches,  get  hold  of 
a  big  tract  of  country,  develop  it,  make  it  a  success? 
It  strikes  me  that  would  be  worth  doing.  I'd  build 
my  house  there,  and  live  a  real  out-door  life;  that 
would  exactly  suit  me.  How  do  you  think  Alice  would 
like  it?" 

I  told  him  that  I  wasn't  sure,  but  that  I  believed 
she  would  be  happy  in  such  a  life.  Vernon  had  spoken 
of  her  finding  herself  there;  certainly  all  the  stronger 
and  better  elements  of  her  character  had  been  evoked 
by  her  brief  experience  of  life  at  Fruitvale. 

"Well,  it's  for  her  to  say  what  she  wants.  And  it's 
for  me  to  give  her  what  she  wants.  I  owe  her  a  great 
deal,  and  I  want  to  pay  my  debt.  That's  about  the 
only  thing  I've  got  to  live  for.  And  when  I  come 
back  I'll  make  it  my  first  business  to  see  whether  I 
can't  give  her  and  myself  some  real  happiness.  After 
all,  I'm  not  too  old  to  make  a  fresh  start.  Perhaps 
I'd  grow  young  again  if  I  made  it." 

It  was  clear  that  all  his  thoughts  centred  in  Alice.  It 
was  as  though  he  had  been  suddenly  aroused  to  a  con- 
sciousness of  fatherhood.  His  eyes  followed  her  wist- 
fully; his  attitude  to  her  was  that  of  a  lover;  when 
they  drove  out  together  he  would  hold  her  hand.  I 
had  seen  him  before  in  softened  moods,  but  now  the 
mood  was  i>ermanent.     He  was  tremulous  with  emo- 


256  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

tion  when  he  spoke  of  her.  And  in  the  brightness  of 
her  eyes,  in  the  way  she  cking  to  him,  there  was  won- 
der and  gratitude  and  understanding.  In  those  last 
days  they  spent  together  before  he  left  her,  they  real- 
ised a  real  intimacy,  such  as  they  had  never  known. 
I  watched  them  without  envy ;  indeed  with  delight  that 
those  long  deferred  arrears  of  affection  were  being 
so  amply  paid ;  and  yet,  not  without  the  fleeting  sense 
from  time  to  time  of  the  ominous,  the  intuition  that 
there  was  the  element  of  a  longer  farewell  than  either 
dreamed  of  in  their  embraces. 

The  other  impression  that  is  vivid  in  my  mind  is  of 
Herridge. 

On  the  night  before  the  Lusitania  sailed  we  had 
our  dinner  together;  but  it  was  not  at  all  the  kind  of 
dinner  which  he  had  planned.  I  expected  him,  and  I 
knew  he  had  intended,  to  have  his  friends  round  him, 
and  make  the  occasion  high-spirited  and  joyous.  On 
the  contrary  I  found  myself  his  sole  guest,  and  he  was 
in  a  very  sombre  mood.  He  confessed  that  his  re- 
luctance to  sail  had  grown  upon  him.  He  acknowl- 
edged that  it  was  quite  unreasonable,  and  he  scoffed 
at  any  presentiment  of  peril.  Only  he  didn't  want  to 
go — that  was  all. 

"I  guess  I've  got  sot  in  my  ways,  as  the  saying  is," 
he  remarked.  "I've  got  into  a  groove,  and  I  don't 
like  being  forced  out  of  it.  I  never  really  liked  travel. 
It's  very  disturbing.  It  has  always  taken  me  a  long 
time  to  get  back  to  normal  again.  Somehow  I  dread 
the  disruption  more  this  year  than  I  ever  did." 

*T  wish  I  were  going,"  I  said.     "Think  of  what 


THE  HOUR  257 

you're  going  to  see — a  great  nation  in  her  hour  of  su- 
preme effort" 

"That's  all  very  well  for  you.     But  I'm  different" 

He  hesitated,  and  then  said  in  an  embarrassed  man- 
ner, "There's  something  I  want  to  tell  you.  I'm  forty, 
and  ever  since  I  left  college  I've  lived  alone.  Well, 
when  I  get  back  I'm  going  to  be  married.  I'm  going 
to  marry  Grace  Lorimer." 

"Grace  Lorimer,"  I  cried.  "I  most  heartily  con- 
gratulate you.  You've  been  very  secret  over  it,  haven't 
you?" 

"I  have.  I  hate  the  fuss  of  an  engagement,  and  so 
does  she.  So  we've  said  nothing  to  any  one  and 
plan  to  get  married  as  quietly  as  possible  when  I 
get  back." 

"No  wonder  you  don't  want  to  go !" 

"Yes,  I've  found  that  love  makes  you  timid.  You're 
so  afraid  of  losing  it  by  any  chance.  Do  you  remem- 
ber when  you  were  a  child,  with  some  special  treat 
promised  you — the  Circus  for  instance,  being  dread- 
fully afraid  you  wouldn't  live  to  enjoy  it?  You  said, 
'Suppose  I  should  die,  and  never  see  the  Circus !'  Well, 
that's  the  sort  of  feeling  I  have.  It's  a  very  foolish 
feeling,  I've  no  doubt,  but  it's  genuine.  A  man's 
afraid  of  nothing  when  he  has  nothing  to  lose,  but  he's 
full  of  fear  when  he  has  some  great  happiness  on 
which  his  heart  is  set  Isn't  it  Browning  who  has  a 
poem  with  the  line,  'What  if  the  world  should  end  to- 
night?' End,  before  he's  consummated  his  love,  is 
what  I  suppose  he  means.    It's  quite  likely  to  happen. 


258  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

too.      My    faith   in   a  guardian   providence   is   much 
weaker  than  my  fear  of  ironic  destiny." 
"But  that's  pure  paganism." 

"Very  Hkely  it  is :  but  after  all  aren't  we  all  pagans 
at  heart?  Aren't  the  wisest  men  afraid  to  sit  down 
thirteen  at  dinner?  Have  we  ever  got  rid  of  the  fear 
of  the  gods,  the  suspicion  that  they  are  inimical  to  us, 
that  they  hate  the  happy  man,  and  are  always  ready  to 
play  him  some  cruel  trick?  Well,  that's  how  I  feel. 
And  I  think  Grace  feels  it  too.  And  so  I  want  you  to 
do  something  for  me :  cheer  up  Grace  while  I'm  away." 
Of  course  I  told  him  I  would,  and  he  seemed  much 
relieved. 

"And  don't  let  her  know  anything  about  my  foolish 
fears.  You  can  let  her  know  that  I  told  you  that  we're 
going  to  be  married.  She'll  be  glad  that  you  know 
that." 

He  went  on  to  speak  of  Grace  with  a  frankness  that 
was  surprising  in  so  reticent  a  man. 

"There's  a  simplicity  about  her  which  took  my  fancy 
from  the  first,"  he  said.  "I  suppose  it's  something 
English ;  at  any  rate  it  isn't  American.  An  American 
girl  knows  her  way  about  the  world  a  little  too  well; 
you're  rather  afraid  that  she  knows  too  much.  Life 
hasn't  any  mystery  for  her.  You  can't  teach  her  any- 
thing about  sex;  she's  taken  an  exact  inventory  of  all 
that  it  means  by  the  time  she's  left  High  School.  I 
don't  mean  that  there's  anything  wrong  about  her. 
She's  clear-minded  and  fine,  and  a  little  hard;  but  the 
iDloom  is  rubbed  off  her.  What  first  attracted  me  in 
Grace  was  her  innocence.     She  didn't  seem  to  know  I 


THE  HOUR  259 

was  a  man,  didn't  want  to  make  any  discoveries  in  that 
line — do  you  understand?  At  first  I  thought  it  was 
a  pose.  Then  I  saw  that  it  was  perfectly  natural,  the 
expression  of  an  inherent  frankness,  modesty,  sim- 
plicity. I  felt  I  could  trust  her,  trust  her  through  life 
to  death.  I've  lived  a  self-centred  life,  though  of 
course  I've  had  my  flirtations  with  women.  Grace  was 
the  first  woman  I  ever  wished  to  marry." 

In  talking  of  Grace  he  had  shaken  off  his  sombre- 
ness.  He  had  become  almost  light-hearted.  He  spoke 
of  what  he  meant  to  do  on  his  return  from  England; 
he  had  the  vision  of  a  house  on  Long  Island  within 
hearing  of  the  sea,  a  small  house,  built  by  a  bankrupt 
artist,  which  he  coveted  and  hoped  to  get.  He  was  al- 
ready negotiating  for  it.  If  all  went  well  he  hoped 
to  be  married  and  settled  in  it  by  July. 

But  his  sombreness  returned  as  we  parted.  We 
walked  up  Fifth  Avenue  together,  under  a  sky  of 
bright  stars.  Looking  up  at  them,  he  repeated  Brown- 
ing's line  again,  with  an  ironical  emphasis — "What 
if  the  world  should  end  to-night?" 

"Don't  come  to  see  me  off,"  he  said.  "I  hate  pub- 
lic partings." 

"You  aren't  the  only  person  sailing  for  Europe," 
I  said.  "Croxon  is  going  too,  and  I  intend  to  see  him 
off;  so  unless  you  wish  to  avoid  me  I'll  see  you  on  the 
docks." 

"O,  that's  another  matter.  What  I  really  meant 
was  that  I  didn't  want  you  to  be  at  any  trouble  to 
see  me  off.  Of  course  I'll  be  glad  to  see  you.  Well, 
good-night  and  good  luck." 


26o  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

The  Lusitania  sailed  next  day.  There  was  a  larger 
crowd  than  usual  at  the  dock.  From  the  upper  deck 
groups  of  people  looked  down  upon  the  animated 
scene,  cheerful  and  tranquil.  There  were  many 
women  among  them,  and  many  children.  Light- 
hearted  farewells  were  exchanged,  and  occasionally 
I  heard  jests  and  sarcasms  at  the  expense  of  the  Ger- 
mans. Croxon  was  in  high  spirits  until  the  moment 
came  for  parting  with  Alice.  Herridge  I  discovered 
sitting  rather  disconsolately  in  his  state-room  with  a 
letter  from  Grace  in  his  hand,  on  which  were  writ- 
ten instructions  that  it  was  not  to  be  opened  till  he 
was  at  sea.  Two  hours  behind  her  schedule,  the  great 
ship  swung  off  from  the  dock,  turned  herself  in  mid- 
stream like  a  strong  bird  ready  for  flight,  and  presently 
became  a  grey  blur  in  the  mid-day  blue. 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  DECISION 


Of  that  which  followed  all  the  world  is  now  aware. 
Many  things  have  happened  since  which  have  over- 
whelmed the  mind  with  horror,  and  stirred  the  heart 
to  furious  indignation,  but  the  afternoon  of  May  the 
seventh,  1915,  stands  apart  in  its  supremacy  of  horror. 

With  the  sailing  of  the  Lusitania  a  certain  quiet- 
ness had  fallen  on  my  mind.  Alice  had  settled  down 
at  Oakwood,  delighted  with  the  freshness  of  the  coun- 
try in  the  bright  spring  weather,  and  had  found  a 
friend  in  Grace  Lorimer.  Her  fears  for  her  father 
and  her  resentment  at  not  going  with  him  to  Paris 
appeared  to  have  dissolved.  She  was  living  in  the 
dream  of  what  he  would  do  when  he  returned.  Her 
manner  toward  me  had  changed.  She  was  at  once 
kinder  and  more  serious,  with  a  touch  of  shyness, 
a  new  reticence  and  modesty.  What  her  father  might 
have  said  to  her  about  me  before  he  went  I  could  only 
guess,  but  I  was  pretty  certain  that  he  had  helped 
me  in  her  regard.  Her  companionship  with  Grace  had 
also  an  effect  upon  her.  Grace  had  told  her  of  her 
love  for  Herridge,  I  did  not  doubt;  and  when  love 


262  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

is  talked  of  between  two  women  there  is  begotten 
a  love  of  love. 

An  instinct  told  me  that  my  wisdom  was  to  let  these 
processes  work  without  active  interposition  on  my 
part.  Alice  had  "found  herself"  at  Fruitvale.  She 
was  perhaps  finding  herself  yet  more  thoroughly  in 
the  quietness  of  Oakwood  with  Grace  for  a  compan- 
ion. I  remembered  a  chance  saying  in  a  forgotten 
book  that  the  true  dual  nature  in  each  of  us  consists 
of  what  we  are  and  what  we  want.  The  latter  is  the 
artificial  self,  the  former  the  real  self.  To  discover 
what  we  are,  isolation  is  necessary.  So  I  judged  it 
wise  to  leave  Alice  alone  as  much  as  possible.  She 
needed  a  breathing  space,  and  indeed  she  seemed  aware 
of  her  need.  She  was  glad  to  see  me  when  I  went 
down  to  Oakwood  for  a  brief  visit,  but  she  had  no 
wish  to  see  any  more  of  New  York.  The  pleasant 
life  of  theatre-going  which  we  had  shared  was  at 
an  end. 

On  the  afternoon  of  May  the  seventh  I  was  cross- 
ing Times  Square,  when  I  became  aware  of  a  sudden 
rush  of  people  toward  the  bulletin  boards.  At  first 
I  supposed  that  what  it  meant  was  the  arrest  of  one 
of  the  noisy  orators  who  at  that  time  were  very  vo- 
ciferous outside  the  Times  office.  A  very  few  mo- 
ments sufficed  to  make  me  aware  that  something  much 
more  important  was  afoot.  The  crowd  grew  with 
an  extraordinary  swiftness.  A  group  of  hatless  men 
rushed  from  a  neighbouring  restaurant,  falling  over 
one  another  in  their  eagerness.  It  was  like  a  foot- 
ball scrimmage,  except  that  a  curious  silence  reigned. 


THE  DECISION  263 

The  newsboys  were  rushing  to  and  fro  in  the  crowd, 
but  even  they  were  silent.  All  at  once  a  singular 
sound  arose,  a  deep  groaning  sound,  like  the  wind  in 
a  forest.  Groups  of  men  detached  themselves  from 
the  crowd,  and  stood  transfixed,  lifting  clenched  fists 
to  the  skies.  Two  women  passed  me,  weeping,  their 
arms  round  one  another's  shoulders.  A  man,  obvi- 
ously German,  ran  across  the  street,  with  a  wild-beast 
cry  of  hellish  glee.  I  pushed  my  way  through  the 
throng,  and  snatched  a  paper  from  a  newsboy.  Then 
I  knew  the  meaning  of  it  all — in  big  black  headlines 
I  read  the  news,  The  Lusitania  sunk  off  the  Coast 
of  Ireland. 

My  first  impulse  was  to  run ;  somewhere,  anywhere, 
just  to — run;  the  impulse  of  the  stricken  beast  with 
an  arrow  in  his  side.  It  was  as  though  the  solid  world 
had  exploded  at  my  feet.  Something  monstrous  had 
happened;  a  devilish  hand  had  been  thrust  up  and  was 
plucking  down  the  sky.  Panic  seized  me.  I  did  actu- 
ally run  down  Forty-third  Street,  shouting  incoherent 
words.  Then,  becoming  conscious  of  my  folly,  I 
stopped,  and  tried  again  to  read  that  fatal  head-line. 
The  words  danced  before  my  eyes.  I  felt  sick.  I 
went  into  a  tobacconist's  and  was  conscious  that  my 
voice  ran  up  and  broke  into  a  treble  cry  as  I  asked 
for  a  cigar.  The  shop  was  one  of  a  long  line  of  shops 
run  by  a  German  firm.  I  might  have  known  that  by 
the  name  over  the  door,  had  I  been  observant.  The 
man  behind  the  counter,  suave  and  stolid,  with  a  close- 
cropped  Teuton  head,  regarded  me  with  a  kind  of 
scornful  pity.    He  probably  believed  that  I  was  drunk. 


264  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

I  leant  over  the  counter  and  whispered  hoarsely,  "The 
Lusitania's  sunk." 

"Serve  her  right.  She  shouldn't  have  sailed.  She 
was  warned  not  to,"  he  said  calmly. 

1  wislied  to  strike  him,  but  my  hand  seemed  para- 
lysed. I  could  only  glare  and  nod  at  him.  A  storm 
of  rage  swept  over  me,  and  left  me  speechless,  help- 
less. Was  I  going  mad?  With  a  strong  effort  I 
pulled  myself  together  and  came  out  into  the  open 
air.  There  I  read  tlie  line  again,  and  managed  to 
gather  the  sense  of  the  paragraph  that  followed  it. 
And  then  the  realisation  of  the  tragedy  broke  upon 
me.  The  Lusitania  had  been  torpedoed,  without  v\rarn- 
ing,  and  fifteen  hundred  lives  were  lost. 

Could  it  be  true?  A  small  desperate  voice  at  the 
back  of  my  brain  whispered  that  perhaps  it  wasn't. 
Atrocious  lies  had  appeared  before,  triumphant  or 
dismaying  rumours,  which  had  been  swiftly  disproved. 
In  the  very  first  hours  of  the  war  hadn't  a  report 
gone  round  the  world  that  the  British  Fleet  had  met 
and  annihilated  the  German,  a  report  declared  official 
and  universally  believed,  yet  absolutely  destitute  of 
truth?  There  was  always  uncertainty  about  things 
that  happened  at  sea.  It  was  quite  upon  the  cards 
tliat  the  Germans  might  have  invented  the  report. 
But  in  my  heart  I  knew  that  the  thing  was  true.  The 
disaster  had  been  definitely  planned,  and  the  plan  had 
succeeded.  The  great  ship,  so  proudly  confident, 
which  I  had  seen  sail  out  in  all  her  strength  and 
beauty,  was  at  the  bottom  of  the  sea.  She  lay  there 
upon  the  ocean  sand — her  wounded  length  still  quiv- 


THE  DECISION  265 

ering  with  the  blow  of  death — and  down  through  the 
dim  green  water  there  slowly  gathered  to  her  those 
whom  she  had  sheltered — her  silent  children,  the 
crowded  faces  of  the  dead,  open-eyed,  with  hair 
streaming  out  like  sea-weed  in  the  eddies — open  hands 
that  clutched  at  nothingness — the  feet  that  had  danced 
upon  her  decks  thrust  out  helplessly,  the  lips  that  had 
been  full  of  speech  silent,  disparted,  agonised — O,  it 
was  horrible!  My  spine  turned  to  ice  at  the  vision. 
My  heart  seemed  about  to  stop.  I  leaned  helplessly 
against  a  lamp-post,  and  dnce  more  a  qualm  of  deadly 
sickness  shook  me. 

There  was  a  block  in  the  traffic;  the  crowd  had  in- 
creased, till  it  seemed  as  though  all  New  York  was 
out  of  doors  at  once.  I  became  conscious  of  a  limou- 
sine drawn  up  against  the  curb.  Within  it  sat 
a  woman,  beautifully  dressed,  whom  I  recognised  as 
a  popular  actress.  She  lowered  the  window  and  was 
speaking  to  me: 

"What  is  it?    Will  you  please  tell  me?" 

I  handed  her  the  paper. 

"My  God!"  she  cried.  "My  mother  was  on  the 
Lusitania." 

She  spoke  in  a  deep  low  voice,  and  yet  it  seemed 
to  me  the  voice  mounted  up  into  the  sky,  and  rang 
there,  like  an  accusing  trumpet. 

Her  voice  brought  me  recollection.  Her  mother  was 
there.  Was  not  Croxon  there  too,  and  Herridge? 
Herridge,  with  Grace  Lorimer's  letter  in  his  hand? 
Had  he  gone  down  with  that  first  and  last  love-letter 
in  his  grasp? 


266  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Out  of  the  chaos  of  my  thought  there  emerged  an 
imperative  and  instant  duty.  I  must  find  out  the  truth 
about  Croxon  and  Ilerridge. 

I  ran  to  the  sul)way.  and  in  twenty-five  minutes  was 
at  Bowling  Green.  Outside  the  Cunard  office  a  great 
crowd  had  gathered.  The  doors  of  the  office  were 
closed.  The  tall  windows  were  red  with  the  setting 
sun,  and  vacant  of  all  life.  An  official  stood  on  the 
steps.  He  was  saying  something,  and  what  he  said 
was  passed  from  man  to  man  in  the  silent  crowd. 
It  reached  me  at  last.  He  confirmed  the  fact  that 
the  Lusitania  was  sunk,  and  begged  the  crowd  to  be 
patient.  It  would  be  some  hours,  perhaps  the  next 
morning,  before  it  would  be  possible  to  get  a  list  of 
the  survivors. 

"The  survivors !"  Were  there  any  ?  The  newsboys 
were  selling  a  special  late  edition  of  the  papers,  in 
which  was  a  slightly  amplified  version  of  the  first 
brief  telegram.  It  stated  that  the  ship  had  sunk  in 
fifteen  minutes.  Fifteen  minutes — what  a  frail 
crowded  bridge  was  that  between  life  and  death! 
How  few  could  cross  it!  Again  there  came  to  me 
the  overwhelming  vision  of  the  scene — the  wounded 
ship  stopped  suddenly  like  a  bird  with  broken  wings, 
heeling  over  in  the  green  surge,  slowly  settling  down, 
her  crowded  decks  awash;  what  chance  of  escape  was 
there  for  any  one?  No  doubt  there  would  be  order, 
courage,  discipline  to  the  last.  The  heroic  whisper 
would  pass  round  from  lip  to  lip,  "Women  and  chil- 
dren first."  Croxon  and  Herridge  would  obey  it. 
They  would  meet  their  fate  with  manly  courage.     I 


THE  DECISION  267 

could  fancy  Croxon,  who  had  met  peril  many  times 
with  iron  nerves,  encouraging  the  timid  and  the  dis- 
mayed; I  was  sure  Herridge  would  meet  death  with 
stoicism.  It  would  be  a  miraculous  chance  indeed  if 
they  were  among  the  survivors. 

But  even  with  the  figures  of  Croxon  and  Herridge 
very  clear  before  my  mind,  it  was  the  collective  trag- 
edy that  I  saw  most  vividly.  There  was  an  immense 
poignancy  in  the  thought  of  that  great  ship  gone  for- 
ever; it  was  a  catastrophic  thing,  like  an  earthquake  that 
destroys  cities,  and  changes  the  features  of  a  land- 
scape. I  knew  her  so  well.  I  had  sailed  on  her,  with  a 
calm  delighted  sense  of  her  strength,  her  order,  her 
security.  There  was  something  divine  and  indomitable 
about  her.  She  was  to  me  a  living  entity,  a  friend, 
a  brave  comrade.  She  moved  across  the  waters  with 
a  planetary  rhythm;  she  belonged  to  the  steadfast 
forces  of  nature,  to  the  stars  and  suns  and  revolving 
heavens.  The  world  could  not  go  on  without  her. 
With  her  disappearance  the  stability  of  all  human 
things  was  shaken. 

A  group  of  men  passed  me,  shouting  vigorously, 
and  disappeared  in  a  German  Rathskeller.  They 
waved  their  hats,  and  one  carried  his  upon  a  walking 
stick.  No  one  interfered  with  them.  People  turned 
their  heads  as  they  passed,  looking  at  them  in  cold 
disapproving  silence,  but  that  was  all.  They  could 
actually  rejoice  in  the  disaster!  They  could  be  glee- 
ful at  the  thought  of  fifteen  hundred  bodies  drown- 
ing in  the  sea.  The  strange  frightened  words  which 
Alice  had  spoken  to  me  four  months  before  in  the 


268  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Waldorf,  flashed  across  my  mind  like  a  white  flame : 
"Something's  happening  to  tJic  world  that  isn't  ra- 
tional. It's  like  a  great  ship  that's  turned  turtle.  All 
tJie  big  familiar  rooms  arc  filled  with  black  water,  and 
we're  just  scrambling  up  tJie  keel  and  clinging  there. 
The  world's  gone  topsy-turz'y.  God's  hand  has  pushed 
it  over." 

"God's  hand" — no,  not  God's  hand,  Alice.  Rather 
a  hand  tlirust  up  out  of  Hell,  that  would  throttle  all 
the  good  and  fair  things  in  the  world.  It  is  the  Devil's 
hand  that  has  pushed  the  world  over ;  and  these  coarse- 
jowled  Germans,  doubtless  drinking  lager  in  the  Rath- 
skeller, with  cruel  glee  over  the  Lusitania,  are  his 
servants. 

"I'm  frightened,"  she  had  said;  and  the  memory 
of  her  words  recalled  me  to  my  present  duty. 

"The  big  familiar  rooms  are  filled  with  black  water 
and  we're  just  scrambling  up  the  keel  and  clinging 

there." 

Here  was  the  thing  itself  which  she  had  imagined 

in  that  premonitory  speech.     I  wondered  if  the  news 

of  the  calamity  had  reached  Oakwood.     No  doubt  it 

had.     And  Grace  Lorimer,  where  was  she? 

I  went  into  a  shop  and  'phoned  Grace  at  the  office. 
Was  she  still  there? 

Yes,  she  was  there.  She  had  been  hoping  that  I 
would  call  her.  She  was  waiting  for  me.  She  dared 
not  go  to  Oakwood  alone. 

"It  isn't  really  true,  is  it?"  she  said  piteously. 

"Yes,  it's  true.    Wait  for  me.     I'm  coming." 


THE  DECISION  269 

She  met  me  at  the  door  of  Herridge's  room;  she 
was  fully  dressed,  ready  to  start  for  Oakvvood, 

"We  must  be  brave  for  the  sake  of  Alice,"  were 
her  first  words. 

I  had  expected  tears  and  lamentations,  but  she  was 
perfectly  composed.  She  astonished  me.  She  bore 
a  strange  resemblance  to  Mary,  which  was  new  and 
startling.  Her  brows  were  drawn  in  the  same  level 
line,  and  her  features,  so  much  more  regular  than 
Mary's,  had  the  same  pale  sternness.  A  thousand 
times  since  I  have  asked  how  it  is  that  women  bear 
the  shock  of  sudden  tragedy  so  much  better  than  men. 
Is  there  a  finer  resilience  in  their  natures,  the  result 
of  a  more  nobly  tempered  patience?  Grace  Lorimer 
had  not  her  sister's  vital  strength.  I  had  known  her 
weak,  I  had  thought  her  selfish.  There  was  neither 
weakness  nor  selfishness  in  her  now.  In  a  moment 
she  had  been  magically  purged  of  both. 

"Her  father  may  be  among  the  survivors,"  she  said 
quietly.  "We  must  make  her  think  so.  Shall  we 
go?" 

She  opened  the  door  of  Herridge's  room,  looked 
into  it  for  a  wistful  instant,  and  closed  the  door 
softly. 

"I'm  quite  ready,"  she  said. 


it 


There  are  crises  of  emotion  which  can  never  be 
described.     They  may  be  perfectly  expressed  in  the 


2-jQ  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

pregnant  phrase  of  a  great  poet,  still  more  poignantly 
uttered  in  the  wordless  passion  of  music,  but  for  the 
ordinary  man  they  are  inexpressible.  Language  fails 
because  it  becomes  insincere.  The  time-worn  phrases 
of  human  grief  become  brittle,  and  snap  under  the 
stress  that  is  laid  upon  them.  In  such  hours  words 
lose  their  significance,  become  inadequate  and  unin- 
telligible, and  ring  hollow  on  the  ear  of  the  spirit. 
It  was  such  a  crisis  which  now  confronted  me. 

When  we  reached  Oakwood  the  dusk  had  fallen. 
During  all  that  melancholy  journey  Grace  Lorimer  had 
not  spoken.  She  sat  beside  the  window  of  the  car, 
with  eyes  fixed  upon  the  pale  green  sky,  in  which 
one  bright  star  burned.  I  took  her  hand  in  mine; 
it  was  indifferent  and  unresisting  as  the  hand  of  the 
dead.  It  was  not  until  the  familiar  woods  came  in 
sight  that  a  slight  shudder  shook  her,  and  her  eyes 
met  mine. 

"We  must  be  brave,  mustn't  we?"  she  whispered. 

There  was  no  one  we  knew  upon  the  little  station. 
We  took  the  road  beneath  the  woods,  until  presently 
the  house  came  in  sight.  There  were  no  lights  in 
the  windows.  It  looked  dark  and  tenantless.  "That  is 
a  sign  she  knows,"  said  Grace. 

She  swayed  as  she  spoke,  and  leaned  heavily  upon 
the  garden-gate. 

*T  can't  grasp  the  truth,"  she  said.  "It  all  looks 
so  peaceful  here — nothing  altered — everything  just  as 
it  was.  This  dreadful  thing — I  can't  understand  how 
God  could  let  it  happen.  I've  been  trying  to  think 
it  hasn't  happened.    But  I  know  it  has.    There's  some- 


THE  DECISION  271 

thing  in  that  dark  house  that  makes  me  know  it's  true. 
God's  never  given  me  what  I  wanted.  It  would  be 
hke  God  to  give  me  something  and  then  snatch  it 
from  me." 

This  was  her  only  moment  of  weakness.  The  re- 
coil came  instantly.  She  drew  herself  up  proudly,  and 
together  w^e  entered  the  garden-gate,  and  walked  over 
the  dark  lawn. 

We  entered  the  house.  No  light  burned  in  the  hall, 
and  the  house  was  silent.  Through  the  open  door 
of  the  dining  room  I  saw  the  two  tall  windows  of 
the  room,  like  grey  spectres,  gleaming  faintly.  From 
the  upstairs  rooms  came  the  soft  murmur  of  a  voice. 
We  went  up,  and  found  the  door  of  Mrs.  Lorimer's 
room  ajar.  In  the  dim  light  we  saw  Alice  huddled 
on  the  bed,  her  face  buried  in  the  pillows,  and  Mrs. 
Lorimer  praying  beside  her.  The  open  Book  of  Com- 
mon Prayer  was  in  her  hands,  and  I  caught  the  pa- 
thetic phrases  of  the  Collect  for  the  Fourth  Sunday 
after  Easter, — "that  so,  among  the  sundry  and  mani- 
fold changes  of  the  world,  our  hearts  may  surely  there 
be  fixed,  where  true  joys  are  to  be  found." 

Alice  sprang  up  at  our  entrance,  gazing  on  us  with 
wild  eyes. 

"O  Gareth !"  she  cried. 

The  arms  of  Grace  were  round  her,  but  it  was  to 
me  she  turned  her  eyes.     She  said  no  other  word. 

Mrs.  Lorimer  beckoned  me  from  the  room.  Out- 
side upon  the  landing  she  told  me  that  the  news  had 
reached  them  in  the  evening  paper.  Alice  had  been 
the  first  to  read  it,  and  had  fainted. 


272  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

•'I've  been  tr>-ing  to  make  her  believe  that  it  may 
not  be  true,"  she  said,  "and  that  even  if  it  is,  her 
father  may  not  be  lost.  She  is  not  to  be  convinced, 
poor  child.  She  is  very  bitter.  Is  there  anything  that 
we  can  do?" 

"Only  wait  for  further  news,"  I  said. 

"Then  I  think  I  will  leave  her  with  Grace.  Per- 
haps Grace  can  comfort  her  better  than  I.  It's  natu- 
ral that  the  young  should  turn  to  the  young  in  their 
grief,  isn't  it?  I  am  an  old  woman,  all  I  can  do  is 
to  pray,  and  Alice  resents  prayer  I'm  afraid,  although 
she  did  let  me  pray  with  her.  What  can  we  do  but 
pray  in  hours  like  these?" 

"Mrs.  Lorimer,"  I  said,  "there's  another  heart  that's 
breaking  beside  Alice's.  I  would  not  have  told  you 
at  any  other  time.  But  you  know  that  Mr.  Herridge 
was  on  the  Liisitania,  and  you  ought  to  know  that 
Grace  was  going  to  marry  him  on  his  return.  They 
meant  it  to  be  secret." 

"A  secret  from  me,  her  mother?"  she  said  proudly. 

"From  every  one.  Herridge  wanted  to  get  this 
voyage  over  before  he  made  plans  for  the  future. 
He  only  toJd  me,  who  am  his  friend,  on  the  night 
before  he  sailed.  I  think  he  was  afraid  to  count 
upon  his  happiness — he  dared  not  publish  it." 

"I  can  understand  that.  Yes,  I've  felt  that  when 
I  was  younger, — the  fear  of  making  too  sure  of  hap- 
piness— but  Grace  might  have  told  me.  I  think  I 
could  have  helped  her." 

And  then,  as  if  there  came  to  her  a  sudden  realisa- 
tion of  what  Grace  must  be  suffering,  she  said  in  a 


THE  DECISION  273  * 

low  voice,  "O,  I  must  go  to  Grace!  She  will  need  me 
more  than  Alice." 

"No,  please  don't,"  I  said  earnestly. 

"Why  not  ?    Do  you  think  Grace  doesn't  want  me  ?" 

"Not  that,  dear  Mrs.  Lx)rimer.  She'll  want  you 
presently ;  you  will  be  the  only  one  she  will  want.  But 
if  you  went  to  her  now  you'd  break  down  her  self- 
control.  Just  now  she's  wonderful,  all  her  thoughts 
are  set  on  comforting  Alice.  Her  strength  lies  in 
that — she's  not  remembering  herself.  But  if  you  go 
to  her  she'll  remember.  At  the  first  touch  of  sym- 
pathy she'll  break.  She  knows  better  than  you  and 
I  how  to  face  the  dark  hour.  Leave  her  alone.  Be- 
lieve me,  it's  wiser." 

"It  hardly  seems  possible  that  Grace " 

"She's  your  daughter.  I  think  she's  acting  as  you 
would  act." 

"O,  far  better  than  I  would  act!  I  don't  think 
I  have  that  sort  of  strength.  But  one  thing  I  do 
understand — sympathy  can  hurt  you  more  than  cal- 
lousness. I  have  had  to  conquer  my  own  griefs  in 
silence.  I  never  quite  realised  it  till  now.  I  never 
understood  why  when  Christ  entered  Gethsemane  he 
made  all  his  friends  but  three  stay  outside,  and  pre- 
sently left  even  them,  as  he  went  a  little  further.  I 
understand  now." 

We  went  downstairs  into  the  familiar  sitting-room. 
A  pile  of  jonquils  lay  upon  the  table,  and  beside  them 
the  evening  paper. 

"Alice  was  arranging  the  flowers  when  the  paper 
came,"  she  said.    "She  was  very  happy." 


274  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

And  then,  with  that  instinct  lor  action  which  will 
make  a  woman  go  on  with  habitual  duties  even  whe.i 
a  world  sinks  beneath  her  feet,  she  began  to  8:atlicr 
up  the  poor  flowers,  and  put  them  in  a  glass  vase. 
When  she  had  done  she  said,  "I  hope  you  won't  think 
me  selfish,  but  I  should  like  you  to  tell  me  something 
of  Mr.  Herridge,  if  you  feel  you  can." 

I  related  to  her  briefly  much  of  what  Herridge  had 
told  me  in  that  last  conversation,  the  loneliness  and 
austerity  of  his  life,  his  hopes  for  the  future,  his  gen- 
uine devotion  to  Grace;  to  which  I  added  my  own 
appreciation  of  his  powers,  my  own  sense  of  obliga- 
tion to  his  friendship.  She  listened  with  grave  eager- 
ness, and  said,  "If  he  is  that  sort  of  man  he  need  not 
have  feared  to  tell  me  about  his  love  for  Grace.  It 
pains  me  to  think  I  did  not  know  him.  If — if  he 
doesn't  come  back — I  could  have  been  of  so  much 
more  comfort  to  Grace  had  I  known  him.  It  would 
have  helped  me  with  Grace." 

A  maid  entered,  saying  dinner  was  served.  I  pro- 
tested that  I  could  not  eat. 

"But  you  must.  Try  to  do  it.  We  have  a  long 
night  and  I  fear  a  terrible  one  before  us.  We  can't 
have  you  breaking  down,  too.  Please  come  in  to 
dinner." 

She  laid  her  hand  on  my  arm,  with  an  air  of  stately 
command,  with  a  slight  affectionate  pressure.  I  felt 
her  hand  tremble  on  my  arm,  but  her  face  was  calm. 
Her  self-control  steadied  me.  I  still  felt  sick  and 
dizzy  with  emotion,  but  I  realised — she  made  me  re- 
alise— that  she  looked  to  me  for  strength,  that  she 


THE  DECISION  275 

was  commanding  all  her  resources  of  fortitude  to  meet 
the  crisis,  and  that  I  must  do  the  same. 

After  dinner  we  sat  before  the  crackling  log  fire. 
The  portrait  of  Charles  Lorimer  looked  down  upon 
us  from  the  mantel,  the  jonquils  lifted  their  delicate 
heads  in  the  warm  air,  the  polished  old-fashioned  ma- 
hogany furniture  reflected  the  cheerful  blaze.  It  was 
all  so  peaceful,  so  stable  in  its  fixed  order,  that  the 
sense  of  tragedy  receded.  The  soft  narcotic  of  use 
and  wont  lulled  my  nerves;  only,  at  intervals,  there 
shot  through  the  heart  the  sharp  pain  of  reality,  the 
desolating  knowledge  of  irremediable  loss. 

In  that  hour  Mrs.  Lorimer  opened  her  heart  to  me 
— that  proud,  sensitive,  tender  heart  which  she  had 
concealed  from  me  under  a  cold  and  distant  manner. 
From  a  great  height  of  wisdom,  hardly  won,  she  spoke 
of  life  and  death  and  eternity,  of  the  unreality  of  life 
and  of  the  deep  reality  of  things  unseen, 

"One  glimpse  of  eternity,"  she  said,  "makes  every- 
thing else  seem  unreal.  I  discovered  that  when  my 
husband  died." 

Beyond  that  single  sentence  I  do  not  recall  any- 
thing she  said;  but  in  its  effect  her  speech  had  the 
quality  of  music,  which  draws  the  sting  of  pain  and 
is  infinitely  soothing  and  consoling. 

About  ten  o'clock  Grace  entered  the  room.  She  had 
put  on  a  plain  black  dress,  which  accentuated  the 
pallor  of  her  face. 

"Alice  is  asleep  at  last,"  she  said.  "She  is  quite 
worn  out." 


276  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

"Won't  you  go  to  l^ed  and  get  some  sleep  too," 
her  mother  said  anxiously. 

"I?  O,  dear,  no;  I  feel  as  if  I  should  never  sleep 
again." 

She  knelt  beside  her  mother,  and  so  we  three  sat 
looking  into  the  red  embers  of  the  dying  fire. 

Presently  she  said,  "This  waiting  is  horrible.  Can't 
we  do  something?" 

*T  can  'phone  the  Cunard  office,"  I  said. 

"Do.  Anything  is  better  than  this  horrible  sus- 
pense." 

I  'phoned  the  office.  They  had  no  list  of  the  sur- 
vivors, but  were  expecting  it  every  minute.  They 
would  'phone  me  the  moment  they  had  news. 

The  hours  passed.  The  fire  had  quite  burned  out. 
No  one  had  drawn  the  blinds,  and  through  the  tall 
windows  we  could  see  the  grey  light  spreading.  A 
bird  began  to  sing,  very  sweet  and  clear.  Far  off, 
within  the  woods,  a  cock  crowed  cheerfully. 

The  'phone  rang.  Its  shrill  insistent  summons  filled 
the  silent  house. 

I  went  to  it,  and  a  thin  far-off  voice  called  my  name. 
"You  wished  to  know — yes — Mr.  Theodore  Croxon, 
Mr.  Milton  Herridge — we  deeply  regret — not  among 
the  survivors. — No — little  hope.     We  fear — lost " 

I  turned,  and  in  the  spectral  dawn-light  saw  Alice 
coming  down  the  stairs.  She  was  in  her  night-robe, 
her  dark  hair  falling  round  her  shoulders,  her  feet 
bare. 

Her  lips  shaped  a  question  rather  than  uttered  it. 

I  shook  my  head. 


THE  DECISION  277 

They  were  both  gone :  the  father,  the  lover ;  and  yet 
outside  the  birds  were  singing,  and  the  grey  light  was 
melting  into  the  gold  of  a  glorious  spring  day. 


Ill 


By  noon  the  world  was  shaken  with  the  news.  It 
was  as  though  a  long  shudder  of  dismay  and  horror 
thrilled  America  from  coast  to  coast.  The  red  hand, 
of  war  had  suddenly  been  stretched  out  across 
the  sea,  and  had  touched  every  home  in  the  American 
Republic. 

Men  asked  one  another  in  dull  amazement  what  kind 
of  war  was  this  that  had  no  scruple  of  pity,  of  chiv- 
alry or  humanity  to  restrain  it?  It  might  be  granted 
that  Germany  had  the  right  to  seize  the  Lusitania,  if 
she  could.  She  had  the  right  to  confiscate  her  cargo, 
to  hold  her  as  a  prize  of  war,  to  capture  and  tow  her 
to  the  nearest  German  port,  and  in  the  event  of  being 
unable  to  do  so,  to  sink  her  after  due  warning,  and 
after  giving  proper  opportunity  to  her  passengers  to 
save  their  lives.  She  had  done  none  of  these  things. 
She  had  sunk  her  without  warning.  It  was  an  act 
of  deliberate  murder.  The  bloodiest  pirate  of  the  Bar- 
bary  Coast  or  the  Spanish  Main  had  never  acted  with 
such  a  callous  indifference  to  human  life.  Captain 
Kidd  was  a  saintly  gentleman  compared  with  the  men 
who  had  deliberately  sunk  the  Lusitania. 

Men  prominent  in  public  life  had  perished.  Still 
worse,  helpless  women  and  children  had  been  foully 


278  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

murdered.  They  had  trusted  to  the  rights  of  na- 
tions, and  the  law  that  protected  non-combatants. 
Those  rights  and  laws  had  ceased  to  exist. 

Up  to  this  hour,  in  spite  of  all  that  had  happened 
in  Belgium,  American  opinion  had  not  been  convinced 
of  German  turpitude.  The  reports  of  her  planned 
and  systematic  outrages  on  women  and  children  had 
been  received  with  incredulity.  Men  who,  in  the 
years  before  the  war,  had  had  business  and  friendly 
relations  with  Germany,  whose  sons  had  been  edu- 
cated at  German  Universities,  whose  daughters  had 
studied  art  and  music  at  Munich  and  Dresden,  found 
it  impossible  to  believe  that  the  German  character 
had  suddenly  become  brutalised  and  bestialised.  They 
were  ready  to  admit  that  there  was  a  reasonable  mo- 
tive in  her  desire  for  expansion.  They  had  long  ad- 
mired her  efficiency,  and  had  refused  to  believe  that 
it  could  become  the  deadly  efficiency  of  murder  and 
assassination.  They  had  been  her  friends :  they  de- 
sired to  be  her  friends.  They  saw  now,  in  a  flash 
of  blinding  light,  that  the  Germany  they  knew  had 
disappeared;  instead  of  it  there  had  arisen  another 
Germany,  as  indifferent  to  humanity  as  the  cannibals 
of  New  Guinea,  and  more  ruthless  in  warfare  than 
the  naked  savages  of  Dahomey. 

I  could  be  of  little  service  to  the  grief -stricken 
household  at  Oakwood.  Mrs.  Lorimer  gently  inti- 
mated so  much,  saying,  "Leave  Alice  and  Grace  with 
me."  The  doctor  was  in  attendance.  He  shook  his 
white  head  gravely,  and  spoke  stereotyped  words 
about  shock — absolute  silence — need  of  quiet.     There 


THE  DECISION  279 

was  nothing  for  me  to  do  but  return  to  New  York 
and  await  events. 

In  the  long  corridors  of  the  Waldorf  I  found  a 
drifting  crowd,  moving  slowly  to  and  fro,  discussing 
in  low  voices  the  latest  scraps  of  news.  There  was 
but  one  question  on  every  lip,  "Does  this  mean  war?" 

"If  this  won't  make  America  fight,  nothing  will," 
I  heard  many  men  saying,  men  with  pale  determined 
faces,  who  spoke  in  bitter  passion. 

Among  the  employees  of  the  Magazine  I  found  the 
same  temper.  These  men  had  honoured  Herridge,  and 
his  death  had  kindled  them  to  fury.  The  younger 
men  stood  about  in  groups,  discussing  what  they  would 
do  if  war  was  declared.  Hardly  one  of  them  doubted 
that  war  was  imminent. 

Then  came  Sunday,  a  Black  Sunday  for  America. 
The  Churches  were  thronged,  and  the  services  had 
a  note  of  funeral  solemnity.  There  was  a  waiting 
aspect  in  the  crowds — the  look  of  men  conscious  of 
impending  climax.  Scraps  of  information,  gathered 
from  the  Sunday  newspapers,  were  discussed  in  whis- 
pers among  these  alarmed  and  serious  worshippers. 
It  had  become  known  that  the  German  Ambassador 
had  been  vainly  interviewed,  had  shaken  off  his  ques- 
tioners with  an  oath,  and  had  refused  to  express  the 
least  sentiment  of  regret  for  the  crime  of  his  country. 

In  the  German  Churches  there  was  either  truculent 
silence,  or  open  condonation  of  the  crime.  There 
were  some  conspicuous  exceptions  among  religious 
teachers  of  German  ancestry.  One  of  these  proclaimed 
with  passionate  indignation  that  from  that  hour  he 


2So  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

repudiated    Germany    and    all    her    works,    and    was 
ashamed  tliat  German  blood  flowed  in  his  veins. 

The  Sunday  passed  in  heavy  foreboding.  Old  men, 
who  had  fought  in  the  Civil  War,  recalled  the  day 
when  Fort  Sumter  fell,  and  said  that  never  since 
had  there  been  a  time  when  men's  souls  had  been  so 
charged  with  moral  indignation.  The  Monday  papers 
did  much  to  deepen  this  indignation.  The  stories  of 
personal  heroism,  the  calmness  with  which  American 
men  of  high  social  standing  had  met  their  fate,  the 
last  words  of  Charles  Frohman  that  death  was  life's 
most  beautiful  adventure,  the  sense  of  genius  and 
character  and  commanding  abilities  lost  to  the  world, 
the  brutal  pitiless  folly  of  the  act — all  these  things 
helped  to  swell  the  growing  flood  of  anger. 

As  the  final  invocation  to  the  rising  patriotism  of 
the  people  came  the  knowledge  that  the  foul  act  had 
been  celebrated  in  Germany  by  public  rejoicing,  by 
school  holidays  and  the  ringing  of  Church  bells,  by 
the  issue  of  a  medal,  struck  long  before  in  antici- 
pation of  the  outrage.  For  the  cruelties  of  war  the 
usual  plea  had  been  that  of  "regrettable  necessity." 
But  in  this  case  there  was  no  spirit  of  regret;  on  the 
contrary  loud  boasting,  vainglorious  congratulation, 
as  if  the  sinking  of  an  unarmed  vessel  were  an  heroic 
act,  of  which  the  nation  might  be  proud!  Even  in 
New  York  this  strange  attitude  of  mind  was  not 
wholly  concealed.  Secretly,  among  themselves;  pub- 
licly, as  far  as  they  dared,  Germans  indulged  in  ghoul- 
ish glee  over  the  disaster.  Their  most  sober-minded 
papers  justified  it.    They  pointed  to  the  warnings  that 


THE  DECISION  281 

had  been  issued,  as  if  Germany  had  the  right  to  dic- 
tate how  and  when  American  citizens  should  sail  the 
seas.  They  made  it  clear,  as  the  entire  voice  of  Ger- 
many was  to  make  it  clear,  that  the  act  was  premedi- 
tated, deeply  plotted,  and  executed  in  deliberate  de- 
fiance of  international  law. 

And  then,  in  the  very  hour  when  the  anger  of  the 
nation  grew  to  boiling-point,  there  came  that  unlucki- 
est  of  speeches  commending  nations  which  were  too 
proud  to  fight. 

It  was  obvious  that  the  phrase  had  no  reference  to 
the  sinking  of  the  Lusitania.  It  had  no  immediate 
relation  to  practical  affairs.  It  was  the  expression  of 
a  remote  idealism.  But  men  did  not  stop  to  con- 
sider these  things.  They  interpreted  it  as  an  expres- 
sion of  unwillingness  to  avenge  the  Lusitania,  and 
they  knew  that  the  world  would  interpret  it  in  the 
same  way.  The  pacifists  seized  upon  it  as  the  justi- 
fication of  their  views.  The  pro-Germans  quoted  it 
with  malignant  scorn.  Others  there  were  who  felt  it 
to  be  a  deadly  blow  to  national  honour,  and  were  sick 
with  shame.  To  them  it  sounded  like  the  death-knell 
of  a  great  people;  of  a  people  who  had  been  great, 
but  were  great  no  more. 

To  me  it  came  with  a  shock  even  more  painful  than 
the  shock  caused  by  the  sinking  of  the  Lusitania.  I 
was  not  an  American,  but  I  loved  America.  My  best 
friends  were  American.  I  was  proud  of  America's 
history,  of  her  traditions  and  achievements,  and  con- 
fident of  her  future.  I  counted  myself  her  son,  her 
proud  and  loving  son.     It  was  as  though  I  saw  my 


282  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

mother  publicly  dishonoured.  I  am  not  ashamed  to 
say  that  tears  of  shame  and  rage  filled  my  eyes  as  I 
read  the  fatal  words. 

It  was  some  slight  consolation  that  I  found  my 
anger  shared. 

"That  is  not  the  true  voice  of  America,"  said 
Ilcnry  Trafford.  His  hands  trembled  as  he  spoke  and 
his  face  was  tragic. 

No:  it  was  not  the  true  voice  of  America,  nor  did 
it  express  the  true  mind  of  the  speaker,  but  in  that 
deep  silence  which  fell  upon  the  land  in  this  hour  of 
consternation,  it  had  the  authority  of  an  oracle. 
Whatever  the  words  were  meant  to  imply,  however 
innocent  their  real  meaning,  the  mischief  was  done. 
In  moments  of  national  perturbation  the  herd  instinct 
is  strong.  Men  huddle  together,  not  knowing  how  to 
act,  and  a  word  can  drive  them.  "Too  proud  to  fight" 
— the  phrase  really  meant  nothing  at  all.  In  an  aca- 
demic address  it  would  have  passed  unnotice3.  Un- 
fortunately a  great  calamity  afforded  it  a  sounding- 
board,  which  sent  it  vibrating  round  the  world.  It 
would  reach  the  soldiers  in  the  trenches,  it  would  pen- 
etrate the  darkened  homes  where  American  men  and 
women  mourned  their  dead  sunk  deep  in  the  cruel  sea, 
it  would  be  reported  wherever  a  printing-press  existed, 
it  would  be  received  with  ribald  laughter  in  the  beer- 
gardens  of  Berlin,  it  would  be  commented  on  with  pity 
more  than  anger  in  the  cabinet  councils  of  Paris  and 
London,  it  would  echo  round  the  shores  of  solitary 
islands  of  the  southern  seas,  and  report  itself  to  lonely 
watchers  on  the  Arctic  circle.     It  could  never  be  re- 


THE  DECISION  283 

called.  History  would  record  it.  It  would  live  with 
the  durable  vitality  of  stars  and  planets.  The  mis- 
chief was  done,  and  could  nevermore  be  undone. 


IV 


To  Trafford  I  poured  out  all  the  tumult  of  my  mind. 
He  was  the  only  friend  I  had  left  in  New  York.  He 
went  with  me  to  the  Cunard  Office,  where  he  was 
well  known.  We  were  shown  into  an  inner  room, 
and  were  received  by  a  grey  agitated  man,  whose  face 
was  ravaged  with  grief  and  sleeplessness. 

"I  have  but  a  few  minutes,"  he  said.  "I  have  been 
up  all  night.    What  can  I  do  for  you  ?" 

Trafford  explained  our  errand.  The  man  silently 
pushed  toward  us  the  latest  cablegram,  and  a  typed 
list  of  the  survivors. 

He  rank  a  desk-bell,  and  a  clerk  appeared. 

"Have  you  any  special  mention  of  Theodore  Croxon 
and  Milton  Herridge?"  he  asked. 

"I  will  see,"  said  the  clerk.  "There's  a  cable  from 
our  man  at  Queenstown  which  is  now  coming  in." 

He  returned  in  a  few  minutes. 

"There  is  no  mention  of  Mr.  Herridge,"  he  said; 
"but  I  find  Mr.  Croxon's  name.  There's  a  Mr.  Davis 
who  was  saved — he's  a  Welsh  colliery-owner,  I  think. 
He  says  that  Mr.  Croxon  behaved  splendidly.  He 
rescued  several  women,  and  got  them  into  the  boats. 
He  was  a  fine  swimmer,  and  he  and  Davis  swam  to- 
gether for  a  long  time.    They  were  clinging  to  a  piece 


284  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

of  wreckage  together,  when  Croxon  suddenly  disap- 
peared.    He  was  never  seen  again." 

"I'm  afraid  that's  conclusive,"  said  the  official.  He 
tried  to  speak  calmly,  but  his  voice  quivered,  and  he 
passed  his  hand  over  his  tired  eyes. 

"I  would  ratlier  have  died  than  this  should  have 
happened,"  he  said.  "The  Lusitania  gone!  It  seems 
impossible." 

He  looked  up  into  TrafFord's  face,  like  a  startled 
child  discovered  in  a  fault,  instinctively  defending 
himself. 

"I  never  thought  they  would  do  it.  O  yes,  there 
were  warnings — I  admit  it — but  we  all  thought  them 
absurd.  There  are  things  I  can't  understand.  They 
say  the  Liisitania  was  going  at  half -speed.  Some  one 
had  given  orders  to  that  effect.  Who,  I  would  like 
to  know?  It  was  suicidal  under  the  circumstances. 
Mr.  Trafford,  there  has  been  treachery  somewhere. 
I'm  sure  of  it.  We've  been  betrayed  by  some  one. 
The  thing  itself  is  horrible  enough,  but  this  certainty 
of  treachery  makes  it  much  more  horrifying." 

"It  isn't  your  fault,"  said  Trafford. 

"No,  it  isn't.  I  know  that.  But  nevertheless  the 
blame  cannot  be  evaded,  and  I  must  bear  my  share 
of  it.  I  am  a  very  unhappy  man,  Mr.  Trafford,  a 
man  who  will  never  be  happy  again." 

We  left  the  stricken  man,  came  out  into  the  fresh 
spring  day,  and  drove  back  to  Trafford's  house. 

There,  in  the  quiet  library,  where  we  had  so  often 
discussed  books  and  literature,  I  told  Trafford  all 
about  my  relations  with  Croxon,  Alice,  and  Herridge. 


THE  DECISION  285 

What  a  mocker}^  those  former  bookish  conversations 
seemed!  How  unreal  all  these  literary  enthusiasms, 
how  narrow,  and  how  selfish!  I  could  fancy  ghostly 
hands  dismantling  the  library,  the  long  rows  of  books 
dissolving  till  the  walls  were  cold  and  bare  as  the 
walls  of  a  mausoleum,  the  pale  wraiths  of  Croxon  and 
Herridge  hovering  over  us,  uttering  incantations,  de- 
claiming woes,  invoking  vengeance  on  intolerable 
wrc«igs. 

"Do  you  remember  what  I  once  told  you  about  this 
war,"  said  Trafford,  "that  it  was  really  the  break-up 
of  the  world  we  know,  that  in  the  end  it  would  range 
all  the  free  peoples  on  one  side  and  the  servile  peo- 
ples on  the  other?    Well,  I  think  that  hour  has  come." 

'Then  you  think  America  will  fight." 

"She  must.     She  must  fight  or  perish." 

"Do  you  mean  she'll  fight  now?" 

"Not  immediately,  I  think.  But  since  last  Friday 
she  has  moved  a  whole  hemisphere  nearer  to  the  con- 
flict. She's  involved  in  it  now,  beyond  all  chance 
of  escape." 

"  Too  proud  to  fight !'  "  I  quoted  bitterly. 

"That's  but  a  passing  catchword.  Dismiss  it  from 
your  mind.  All  that  it  means  is  that  America  won't 
fight  for  pride,  but  I  greatly  mistake  her,  if  she  won't 
fight  for  liberty.  Yes;  she'll  do  that,  when  she  sees 
that  her  own  liberty  is  at  stake.  And  she  knows  that 
it  is  at  stake  now." 

"Then  she  will  declare  war  on  Germany?" 

"Not  immediately,  I  repeat.  We're  too  diverse,  too 
inchoate  as  a  people — we're  not  fused.     The  fire  of 


286  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

moral  indignation  is  lit  and  can  never  be  put  out; 
but  it  hasn't  penetrated  very  far  yet.  It  will  seem 
to  die  down,  but  it  won't.  It  will  reach  the  centre 
finally,  sooner  than  we  think,  perhaps,  but  we  must 
wait  and  be  patient." 

"But  I  can't  wait,"  I  cried. 

"I'm  not  asking  you  to,"  he  said  gravely.  "For 
you  I  think  the  hour  has  come." 

He  laid  his  hand  upon  my  shoulder,  and  I  realised 
something  anointing,  something  consecrating  in  his 
touch. 

"I  wish  I  could  go,"  he  said.  "How  gladly  would 
I  go.  If  I  were  only  young!  But  perhaps  before  it's 
over  I  may  do  something,  too.  I've  lived  in  ease  and 
comfort  too  long.  I'm  a  poor  old  Ulysses,  but  like 
Ulysses  I  would  like  to  do  some  work  of  noble  note 
before  the  end,  and  I  say  sometimes,  *  'Tis  not  too 
late  to  seek  a  newer  world.'  Believe  me,  if  I  had  but 
one  thing  to  ask  of  God  which  I  knew  that  He  would 
grant  me,  I  would  ask  the  privilege  of  dying  for  my 
country  and  her  liberty." 

The  warm  light  of  the  May  afternoon  filled  the 
room,  and  it  reminded  me  of  a  duty  postponed  by 
circumstances.  I  had  to  meet  Alice,  I  had  to  com- 
fort her  grief,  and  give  her  the  final  news  about  her 
father.  Since  the  catastrophe  I  had  had  no  conver- 
sation with  her,  and  I  could  but  dimly  guess,  and  also 
fear,  what  her  thoughts  might  be.  I  opened  my  heart 
to  Trafford.  I  told  him  all  about  Croxon's  attitude 
to  the  war,  and  the  aversion  which  Alice  had  to  it. 

"She  is  a  brave  man's  daughter — remember  that," 


THE  DECISION  287 

he  said.  ''Conceal  nothing  from  her.  The  hour  has 
come  for  you  :  this  is  her  hour,  too ;  it  will  test  you  both. 
I  think  she  will  meet  the  test  with  courage,  and  I  will 
tell  you  why — women  are  quicker  to  respond  to  diffi- 
cult ideals  than  men.  I  suppose  it  is  true  of  all  of 
us  that  extreme  anguish  clears  the  depths  of  the  soul, 
so  that  the  unworthy  elements  of  one's  nature  drop 
to  the  bottom  and  are  dissolved;  but  I'm  sure  it  is 
a  process  more  common  among  women  than  men." 

Yes,  I  had  already  discovered  that  in  Grace  Lorimer. 
I  had  seen  one  whom  I  had  thought  weak  develop  un- 
der sudden  stress  heroic  qualities.  And  Alice  was  not 
weak;  there  was  a  fundamental  strength  in  her. 

"You  know  the  old  lines,"  said  Trafford  with  a 
grave  smile : 

"'I  could  not  love  thee,  dear,  so  well 
Loved  I  not  honour  more.' 

That  was  an  appeal  addressed  to  a  woman  by  a  man 
going  to  the  wars.  There's  no  true  and  noble  woman 
who  can  resist  it.  God  bless  and  prosper  you,  my  dear 
boy." 

He  accompanied  me  to  the  door,  and  stood  there 
bareheaded,  as  his  courteous  habit  was. 

I  walked  slowly  down  the  quiet  street,  with  the  sense 
of  his  benediction  resting  on  me,  like  a  warmth  of 
heavenly  sunlight,  and  took  my  way  to  the  darkened 
house  at  Oakwood. 

V 

I  'phoned  from  New  York  the  train  by  which  I 
would  arrive  at  Oakwood.    To  my  surprise  Alice  met 


288  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

me  at  the  station.  Her  eyes  were  dark-ringed,  the  lids 
had  a  purphsh  stain  and  were  swollen,  her  face  was 
of  an  ivory  white,  but  her  manner  was  quiet  and 
composed. 

"I  met  you  because  I  wanted  to  talk  to  you  quite 
alone,"  she  said. 

We  walked  slowly  up  the  road,  till  we  came  to  a 
footpath  that  led  through  the  woods  to  the  summit 
of  the  hills. 

"Let  us  go  into  the  woods,"  she  said.  "I  can't  face 
the  house  at  present;  I  couldn't  talk  there." 

She  looked  at  me  with  a  little  ghost  of  a  smile,  pa- 
thetic and  whimsical,  and  added,  "Our  best  hours  to- 
gether have  been  spent  in  the  open  air,  haven't  they? 
One's  soul  seems  to  breathe  outdoors,  doesn't  it?" 

We  entered  the  wood  and  began  to  climb  the  steep 
path  in  silence.  The  last  year's  leaves  were  soft  be- 
neath our  feet,  a  film  of  living  green  was  on  the 
trees,  splashes  of  hot  sunlight  made  golden  pools 
around  us,  and  far  away,  secret  and  remote,  we  could 
hear  the  cooing  of  doves. 

We  came  at  last  to  the  open  sward  and  the  rocky 
crest  with  its  surprising  view.  The  great  plain  lay 
at  our  feet  like  a  piece  of  woven  tapestry.  New  York 
was  distinctly  visible,  with  its  white  towers,  its  spec- 
tral ramparts,  and  its  shining  breadth  of  waters.  The 
sun  was  sinking  and  a  slow  sea  of  crimson  was  suf- 
fusing everything. 

"Let  us  sit  here,"  she  said.  "And  now  tell  me  what 
you  have  found  out  about  my  father." 


THE  DECISION  289 

I  told  her  all  I  had  heard  that  morning  at  the 
Cunard  Office. 

"He  died  bravely.  He  saved  others,  himself  he 
could  not  save.     It  was  an  heroic  death." 

She  sat  perfectly  still,  her  wistful  eyes  fixed  upon 
the  fading  towers  of  New  York  and  the  crimsoned 
water,  as  if  trying  to  visualise  the  scene. 

"He  died  bravely,"  she  repeated,  like  a  child  re- 
peating a  hard  lesson.  "Yes,  he  would  do  that.  He 
was  a  great  man." 

"A  greater  man  than  we  knew,  Alice." 

"Not  greater  than  I  knew.     I  always  knew  it." 

She  began  to  talk  in  a  soft  voice,  which  reminded 
me  vividly  of  that  inexpressible  tenderness  which  I 
had  found  so  moving  in  her  father's  voice,  when  he 
spoke  of  his  dead  wife  and  of  his  vanished  happi- 
ness. 

"When  I  was  a  little  child  I  used  to  wonder  at  him ; 
he  was  so  strong  and  big.  When  I  said  my  prayers 
at  night  I  really  pra3^ed  to  him :  he  seemed  like  God. 
And  when  he  used  to  come  to  me  at  Tabraham's,  I 
would  weave  all  kinds  of  romance  about  him.  He 
was  a  knight  riding  up  to  a  castle  held  by  a  dragon — 
he  was  King  Arthur — Lancelot — and  I  wished  he'd 
wear  silver  armour,  and  ride  up  to  the  door  with  a 
blast  of  trumpets.  It  all  came  back  to  me  last  night — 
those  childish  dreams,  and  I  saw  that  they  were  true. 
Somehow,  I  think  he  wasn't  very  keen  on  living.  He'd 
found  life  disappointing.  Perhaps  he  was  disap- 
pointed, too,  in  himself.     He  hadn't  found  any  really 


290  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

big  thing  to  do,  anything  big  enough  for  his  great- 
ness.    But  he  found  it  at  the  last,  didn't  he?' 

"I  think  he  was  disappointed  in  me.     I've  been  very 
selfish.      In   the  midst  of  all  my  grief   the  thought 
came  to  me  that  he  shouldn't  be  disappointed  in  me 
any  more.     It  was  just  after  the  news  had  come  over 
the  'phone.     I  went  back  to  my  room  and  locked  the 
door.     I  didn't  want  Grace;  I  had  been  selfish  with 
her  too,  and  had  forgotten  what  she  had  lost.    I  didn't 
want  you — I  wanted  to  be  quite  alone.    The  dawn  was 
just  breaking,  do  you  recollect?     The  room  was  very 
still,  and  a  bright  ray  of  light  began  to  move  across 
the  floor.     And  then,  all  at  once,  I   felt  that  I  was 
not  alone.    I  didn't  see  any  one,  but  I  knew  some  one 
was  there.     And  I  knew  who  it  was.     I  wasn't  in  the 
least  afraid.     It  was  as  though  the  sunlight  on  the 
floor  stood  up,  and  had  a  shape,  and  moved  toward 
me,  and  wrapt  me  all  round,  like  warm  strong  arms. 
And  I  heard  him  say,  'My  little  girl  must  be  brave 
It  will  make  me  happy  if  I  know  she's  brave.'     All 
at  once  the  pain  went  out  of  my  heart,  and  since  then 
I've  been  quite  calm.     Not  happy — O,  no — but  just 
quiet  in  my  mind,  as  though  a  great  wind  had  died 
down  and  left  a  stillness. 

"1  saw  too  that  I'd  been  selfish  in  another  way.  I 
hadn't  thought  much  about  all  the  suffering  and  hor- 
ror of  the  war.  I  hadn't  cared  to  know  what  had 
caused  it.  I  was  only  meanly  glad  that  it  hadn't 
touched  my  happiness.  I  knew  all  at  once  how  wrong 
I'd  been.  The  war  had  killed  my  father.  It  was  a 
thing  so  horrible  that  no  man  was  safe.     It  was  the 


THE  DECISION  291 

work  of  devils — devils  who  must  be  crushed.  To  sit 
quiet  and  do  nothing  was  to  connive  in  its  wickedness. 
It  was  to  betray  God." 

She  turned  and  put  her  hands  upon  my  shoulders, 
looking  deep  into  my  eyes. 

"Gareth,  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?  We've 
played  out  our  idyll  together.  The  play  has  become 
reality.  I've  given  you  a  knightly  name.  Will  you  be 
worthy  of  it?" 

"I'm  going  to  enlist,"  I  said. 

"You  would  have  done  it  before  but  for  me, 
wouldn't  you?" 

"Not  that  altogether.  I've  been  selfish  too.  I've 
been  self-centred,  egoistic,  intent  on  my  own  aims  in 
life.     I've  put  off  decision." 

"When  did  you  decide?" 

*Tn  the  hour  the  Lusitania  sank.  Millions  will  feel 
as  I  do.  I  can  claim  no  credit.  The  true  honour  be- 
longs to  Alan  Joddrel,  and  young  Charles  Lorimer — 
the  men  who  knew  their  duty  from  the  first,  and  didn't 
hesitate." 

I  went  on  to  tell  her  of  my  conversation  with  Traf- 
ford.  America  would  not  fight — yet.  If  she  should 
declare  war  to-morrow,  I  and  multitudes  of  others 
would  be  proud  to  fight  beneath  her  colours.  But  she 
would  not  declare  war ;  the  nation  was  not  ready  for  it. 

"What  will  you  do  then?" 

"Go  to  Canada.     I  can  enlist  there." 

"Would  they  take  me  as  a  nurse,  Gareth?" 

"Would  you  go?" 

"Yes.    Mary  Lorimer  has  gone.    I've  lived  for  my- 


292  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

self  long  enough.  I've  reasoned  it  all  out.  If  I  should 
stay  here  my  heart  would  break.  If  I'm  doing  some- 
thing, helping  others,  I  shall  find  a  kind  of  peace. 
And  only  if  I  do  this  can  I  hope  that  my  father  won't 
be  disappointed  in  me." 

The  sun  had  set,  but  the  warm  radiance  still  lin- 
gered.    We  rose  to  go. 

"Alice,"  I  said.  "Forgive  me,  if  I  ask  one  ques- 
tion. You  said  the  idyll  had  become  reality.  Is  it 
to  go  on — a  real  idyll,  dear?    You  know  what  I  mean." 

For  answer  she  put  her  hand  in  mine,  and  so  we 
stood,  silent,  with  the  darkening  world  at  our  feet. 

Just  as  we  turned  to  go,  she  said  quietly,  "But  it 
would  have  ended,  if  you  hadn't  told  me  what  you 
did." 

VI 

I  record  one  more  incident  of  that  night  of  May. 

Just  before  I  left  to  return  to  New  York  I  told  Mrs. 
Lorimer  that  I  was  going  to  Canada  to  enlist.  She 
kissed  me  on  the  forehead,  and  said,  "I'm  glad.  And 
whatever  happens  I  tliink  you'll  be  glad." 

"And  I  too,"  said  Grace.     "You'll  avenge  us." 

Her  eyes  blazed,  her  brows  were  drawn  into  a  level 
line,  and  her  resemblance  to  her  sister  was  startling. 
Even  her  voice  had  the  hoarse  intensity  of  Mary's 
voice. 

"I  want  to  kill,"  she  said  bitterly.  "I  want  to  kill 
Germans.  I  wish  the  whole  accursed  race  was  killed. 
I've  found  out  I  still  believe  in  hell.  God  made  it  be- 
cause He  knew  that  it  would  be  needed  for  the  Ger- 


THE  DECISION  293 

mans.  I've  not  much  left  to  live  for,  but  I've  got  this 
— to  be  avenged." 

Mrs.  Lorimer  put  her  arms  round  her,  and  drew  her 
to  her  bosom,  where  she  lay  trembling  with  her 
passion. 

"No,  no,  Grace.  We  mustn't  think  like  that.  We 
mustn't  fight  for  vengeance,  however  just  it  may  ap- 
pear. We  must  fight  for  something  bigger,  dear.  We 
must  fight  to  make  a  better  world.  It's  not  hate  we 
want — it's  love — love  of  right,  and  faith.  We  soon 
tire  of  hating.  It  exhausts  us.  But  our  strength  is 
fed  on  love.  We  grow  strong  by  loving.  And  if  we 
love  right  with  all  our  hearts  I  think  we  come  to  pity 
those  who  do  wrong,  to  pity  them  much  more  than 
we  hate  them,  knowing  how  unhappy  they  must  be." 

I  could  not  but  listen  with  reverence  to  that  wise 
and  gentle  voice :  yet  it  seemed  to  utter  a  counsel  of 
perfection.  My  heart  was  too  hot  with  its  throbbing 
bruise  to  be  healed  by  such  soft  medicaments.  I  did 
hate,  and  I  told  myself  I  did  well  to  hate.  I  could 
not  say  of  these  deliberate  murderers  that  I  forgave 
them  for  they  knew  not  what  they  did :  they  did  know, 
and  the  pardon  due  to  ignorance  they  could  not  claim. 
All  too  clear  to  my  eyes  was  the  result  of  their  abom- 
inable crime — Grace  robbed  of  her  lover,  Alice  of  her 
father;  perhaps  Mrs.  Lorimer  herself  robbed  of  her 
son,  who  at  any  moment  might  be  reported  among  the 
maimed,  the  missing  or  the  dead. 

But  as  I  walked  down  the  road  to  the  station,  with 
the  silence  of  the  starry  night  around  me,  I  reached 
a  calmer  frame  of  mind.     "We  must  fight  for  some- 


294  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

thing  bigger  than  hate — we  must  fight  to  make  a  bet- 
ter world" — was  not  that  a  true  saying? 

I  was  going  to  kill  men,  but  if  I  killed  them  with 
hatred  in  my  heart,  that  was  murder.  If  war  meant 
that,  it  was  what  the  pacifists  so  often  called  it — 
organised  assassination.  But  if  I  fought  without  any 
hatred  of  individual  men  in  my  heart,  only  hatred 
of  the  thing  they  represented,  I  fought  with  love  of 
right  in  my  heart.  And  when  men  did  this,  war  was 
not  organised  murder,  but  organised  retribution. 

The  thought  came  to  me  that  the  Christ  in  whose 
teachings  and  example  Mrs.  Lorimer  found  her 
strength  to  suffer  and  endure,  knew  how  to  hate.  But 
there  was  this  strange  quality  in  his  hatred,  that  it 
was  not  directed  against  the  individual.  He  hated 
Pharisaism,  but  he  dined  with  Pharisees;  he  hated  per- 
fidy, but  he  spoke  tenderly  to  Judas.  His  love  was  so 
much  greater  than  his  hatred  that  his  hatred  itself 
was  enraged  love — it  was  "the  wrath  of  the  Lamb." 
It  was  love  that  was  the  light,  and  hatred  the  shadow ; 
the  shadow  that  made  love  visible. 

And  I  saw,  too,  that  it  was  the  spirit  of  hate  that 
had  ruined  Germany.  The  spirit  of  envy,  jealousy, 
covetousness,  ignoble  spite,  at  last  culminating  in  a 
diabolic  hate.  Hatred  for  all  the  things  that  made 
for  love  and  gentleness,  denunciation  of  them  as  the 
weakness  of  cowardice;  the  worship  of  hardness,  the 
scientific  culture  of  ferocity.  And  because  hate  is 
blind,  total  ignorance  of  what  went  on  in  ordinary 
human  hearts,  their  secret  sanctities  and  ideals,  the 
things  they  held  sacred — such  things  as  honour,  mag- 


THE  DECISION  295 

nanimity,  fidelity  to  the  pledged  word,  abhorrence  of 
brutality  and  cruelty. 

That  was  why  the  Lusitania  had  been  sunk — it  was 
the  work  of  blind  unreasoning  hatred.  Because  her 
hatred  had  blinded  her,  Germany  could  not  compre- 
hend how  her  act  would  be  regarded.  She  could  not 
perceive  that  she  had  pilloried  herself  in  undying  in- 
famy. Hatred  had  alienated  her  from  the  common 
conscience  of  mankind.  She  did  not  know  how  that 
conscience  worked,  what  were  the  principles  of  its 
judgment,  because  this  madness  of  hatred  had  de- 
stroyed her  power  of  vision.  She  would  go  on  doing 
things  at  which  the  world  shuddered,  until  at  last  the 
cup  of  her  iniquity  was  full,  and  the  whole  world 
would  unite  to  make  an  end  of  her,  as  the  most  peace- 
ful men  unite  to  kill  a  rabid  dog. 

No,  I  must  not  fight  like  that;  I  must  not  make 
revenge  my  chief  thought,  for  if  I  did  I  should  be  mas- 
tered by  my  hate,  and  my  hate  would  brutalise  me. 

There  came  to  me  the  vision  of  Charles  Lorimer 
and  Alan  Joddrel,  and  the  crowd  of  joyous  youthful 
faces  in  those  grim  fighting  lines — the  cleanness,  the 
grace,  the  boyish  cheerfulness,  the  jesting  courage :  no, 
these  were  not  haters.  They  were  sweet-natured ;  war 
could  not  make  them  ill-natured,  bitter,  brutal.  And 
I  knew  why — it  was  because  they  saw  war  as  a  Cause, 
not  an  Enmity.  They  fought  for  a  big  thing,  some- 
thing so  much  bigger  than  themselves  that  the  per- 
sonal element  was  lost  sight  of,  overwhelmed,  all  but 
eliminated. 

Had  not  I  already  caught  a  glimpse  of  what  that 


296  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

meant?  Alice  had  revealed  it  to  me.  She  had  npt 
urged  me  to  revenge.  She  had  risen  beyond  her  per- 
sonal grief;  she  had  recognised  a  Cause,  for  which  it 
■was  good  that  men  should  give  themselves,  should  re- 
nounce all  things,  should  be  willing  to  die.  Even  Love 
had  acknowledged  that  supreme  claim.  The  long  an- 
ticipated moment  of  surrender  had  been  achieved  in 
silence.  No  word  of  rapture,  not  even  a  kiss — only 
a  firm  hand  laid  in  mine,  the  cold  sweetness  of  a  nun- 
like pledge,  the  sense  of  knightly  vows  before  an  altar. 
Not  tliat  she  was  really  cold;  but  that  the  personal 
elements  of  life,  of  which  the  love  of  woman  for  man 
and  man  for  woman  are  chief,  had  become  insignifi- 
cant before  the  grandeur  of  impersonal  aims.  She 
loved  me,  but  she  could  not  love  me  unless  the  Cause 
was  dearer  to  me  than  her  love. 

And  so  beneath  that  starry  sky,  out  of  the  silent 
immensities,  came  the  true  Call,  which  I  had  once 
thought  was  not  for  me. 

It  was  the  call  to  lose  the  personal  elements  of  life 
in  surrender  to  the  collective  elements,  in  which  self 
had  no  place. 

"For  this  cause  shall  a  man  leave  father  and  mother 
and  wife  and  children " 

Shall  leave  them,  but  that  he  may  find  them.  Love 
could  be  found  in  no  other  way.  To  cling  to  love  at 
the  sacrifice  of  duty  was  to  lose  it. 

And  that  low-spoken  word  of  Alice's  filled  my 
heart;  if  I  had  not  been  willing  to  lose  her  I  could  not 
have  found  her;  if  I  had  not  been  willing  to  enlist  our 
idvll  would  have  ended. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
SIX  MONTHS  LATER 


The  Camp  lies  round  me  very  silent  under  the  vast 
arch  of  night.  I  can  hear  the  restless  champing  of 
the  horses  in  the  stables  five  hundred  yards  away,  the 
hoot  of  an  owl  in  the  woods,  the  whistle  of  a  freight- 
train  in  the  cutting.  These  are  the  major  sounds,  but 
there  are  many  minor  ones — the  rustle  of  dead  leaves 
and  dry  grasses,  the  soft  stir  of  tiny  creatures  in  the 
road  bank  beneath  my  tent,  the  noise  of  a  rolling  peb- 
ble in  its  sharp  impact  on  the  road;  and,  all  round 
me,  the  intaken  breath  of  sleeping  men.  A  round 
yellow  moon  is  tilted  forward  on  the  black  edge  of 
the  pine-clad  hills.  A  thin  scud  of  cloud  is  weaving 
a  veil  of  gossamer  across  the  zenith.  The  ancient 
earth  swings  upon  its  course  like  a  sleeping  ship,  skirt- 
ing the  dark  shores  of  infinity,  directed  by  this  light- 
house moon,  and  the  stars  which  twinkle  like  fire- 
eyed  buoys  upon  unfathomable  waters. 

I  cannot  sleep.    All  the  past  goes  streaming  through 

my  mind  like  an  endless  picture-film.     I  know  that  I 

have  come  to  one  of  those  hours  of  life  when  the  soul 

takes  stock  of  its  emotions  and  experiences  and  seeks 

to  realise  itself. 

297 


298  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

The  intense  stillness  of  the  night  recalls  many  sum- 
mer nights  in  Friiitvale.  Poor  Fruitvale,  how  scat- 
tered are  its  simple  folk!  Vernon  is  in  Mesopotamia, 
little  Mrs.  Vernon  is  working  in  a  munition  factory 
at  Ottawa,  Button  has  purged  his  memory  forever 
from  its  rankling  stain  of  cowardice  by  a  soldier's 
death  at  Ypres.  Morrison  alone  remains,  still  read- 
ing the  Overseas  edition  of  the  Times,  and  uttering 
oracular  opinions  upon  the  conduct  of  the  war,  but 
to  a  sadly  diminished  audience,  for  the  ranches  are 
deserted.  Weeds  grow  thick  among  the  trees,  and 
the  windows  of  the  homes  are  boarded  up.  All  the 
men  have  gone,  and  one  by  one  the  women  are  going 
too.  Even  old  Mrs.  Hales  has  gone;  she  is  in  Eng- 
land  with  her  wounded   son,   who  will  never   walk 


agam. 


Since  that  May  evening  when  I  left  New  York  for 
Ottawa  so  much  has  happened  to  me  that  I  no  longer 
seem  the  same  person. 

First  of  all  came  the  physical  discipline.  I  found 
myself  back  at  school,  but  a  school  where  physical 
values  were  the  chief  things  required.  I  realised  that 
I  had  never  been  genuinely  tired  before.  In  other 
days  when  I  was  tired  I  could  rest ;  but  here,  however 
weary  I  might  be,  I  had  to  go  on.  Riding  bare-back 
for  a  dozen  miles  before  breakfast  is  no  joke;  men 
often  came  back  with  their  legs  raw  and  streaming 
with  blood.  If  a  man  fell  off  he  got  no  sympathy. 
He  was  jeered  at  by  his  mates,  and  told  by  his  officer 
to  go  to  London — only  it  wasn't  London — and  ride 
doped  donkeys  on  a  blasted  heath.    A  harder  man  than 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  299 

that  instructor  I  never  met;  his  eyes  was  hard  and 
clear,  his  face  hard  as  granite,  and  his  voice  hard  as 
an  inquisitor's,  with  a  sort  of  mocking  rage.  But 
he  knew  his  business,  and  after  a  time  I  recognised 
what  his  business  was.  It  was  to  break  down  incom- 
petents, to  create  competence  out  of  poor  material. 
There  were  times  when  I  could  have  shot  him  will- 
ingly, so  brutal  were  his  gibes  at  some  poor  chap  who 
failed  beneath  his  iron  discipline.  There  were  other 
times  when  I  could  conceive  no  higher  satisfaction 
than  to  win  a  brief  glance  of  approval  from  those 
hard  eyes.  At  the  bottom  of  my  thoughts  was  a  stub- 
born resolution  that  he  should  not  break  me.  I  might 
die  beneath  the  test.  I  might  even  desert  in  some 
passionate  moment  of  despair,  but  no  man  should  dare 
to  call  me  incompetent. 

Of  that  physical  discipline  I  can  now  say  that  it  was 
one  of  the  best  things  that  ever  happened  to  me.  The 
pure  air,  the  hard  exercise,  the  rough  fare,  the  dream- 
less sleep  worked  a  reconstitution  of  my  members.  My 
blood  moved  more  swiftly  in  my  veins,  and  there  was 
pure  joy,  such  as  young  children  feel,  in  the  very 
movement  of  my  limbs. 

There  was  a  mental  reconstitution,  too.  My 
thoughts,  which  had  so  long  been  turned  inward,  were 
now  turned  outward.  They  were  all  directed  toward 
immediate  duties — simple,  necessary,  practical  things 
that  must  be  done.  There  came  to  me  slowly  the 
thrilling  sense  that  I  was  part  of  a  gigantic  whole.  I 
was  no  more  a  detached  personality;  I  was  an  atom 
in  something  corporate.     This  corporate  thing  men 


300 


THE  WAR  EAGLE 


called  an  Army.  It  was  a  vast  entity,  whose  tentacles 
embraced  the  world.  Its  vigour  and  its  life  depended 
on  me.  as  the  body  depends  on  the  true  functions 
of  each  tiniest  atom  for  its  health.  Men  upon  the 
fields  of  Flanders,  men  beside  the  Tigris,  men  moving 
like  dark  specks  across  the  sands  of  Egypt  were  knit 
to  me  by  invisible  nerves  and  ligaments,  and  I  to 
them.  If  I  failed  they  would  be  the  weaker  for  my 
failure,  and  if  I  were  strong  they  would  be  the  stronger 
because  of  me. 

It  was  a  hard  thing  at  first  to  submit  to  authority, 
to  know  that  I  was  no  longer  free.  It  was  a  harder 
thing  to  recognise  in  those  set  over  me  no  gleam  of 
intellectual  superiority.  They  cared  for  none  of  the 
things  I  cared  for,  knew  none  of  the  things  I  knew, 
and  would  have  despised  them  had  they  been  aware 
of  them.  But  there  was  no  denying  the  fact  that  they 
knew  many  things  I  did  not  know.  And  they  knew, 
the  very  things  that  I  was  there  to  learn.  It  was  my 
business  to  lay  guns,  to  calculate  velocities  and  dis- 
tances, to  know  how  to  drive  a  gun  into  action  with 
the  utmost  speed  and  with  a  keen  eye  for  position. 
They  could  teach  me  all  these  things,  and  after  all 
these  were  the  things  I  wanted  most  to  know. 

I  look  back,  and  see  myself  struggling  on  from  day 
to  day,  tired  to  death,  humiliated  by  my  failures,  glow- 
ing with  pride  at  my  rare  successes — but  always  strug- 
gling on.  I  whipped  my  flagging  energies  with  the 
thought  that  what  others  could  accomplish  I  could 
do.  Gradually  there  came  to  me  a  sort  of  joy  that 
I  had  lost  my  former  self.     It  hovered  like  a  dis- 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  301 

housed  spirit,  pitiable  and  absurd,  on  the  horizons  of 
consciousness,  and  finally  disappeared.  I  saw  my  ego- 
isms, my  vanities,  my  weaknesses  shredded  off,  as 
a  man  puts  off  his  clothes  that  his  body  may  stand,  in 
its  strong  nakedness,  unashamed  against  the  sun. 

Above  all,  there  came  to  me  the  sense  of  some- 
thing big,  something  Titanic,  that  loomed  beyond  all 
the  petty  details  of  the  camp  and  the  parade-ground. 
It  was  the  Cause,  the  Crusade,  the  great  Vortex  of 
heroism  that  was  sweeping  in  life  after  life,  using  it, 
transforming  it,  making  it  part  of  an  immortal  strug- 
gle. As  I  look  upon  this  quiet  midnight  sky  I  hear 
the  distant  rush  of  its  tremendous  tides.  It  is  com- 
ing nearer,  and  I  am  glad  of  it. 

It  has  come  very  near  now.  Three  days  ago  some 
hundreds  of  our  men  left  for  England  and  the  front. 
I  saw  them  go,  singing  as  they  marched,  and  all  at 
once  I  conceived  an  extraordinary  affection  for  them. 
Some  of  them  I  knew  well,  some  a  little,  some  not  at 
all.  There  were  all  sorts  among  them,  the  college  boy, 
the  farm-hand,  the  clerk,  the  mechanic:  the  orderly, 
the  sloven,  the  serious-minded,  the  hare-brained;  with 
a  fair  proportion  of  dare-devils,  for  whom  life  was 
a  joke  and  war  an  adventure ;  yet  they  were  my  com- 
rades in  arms.  They  represented  humanity  to  me — 
the  bit  of  humanity  I  knew  best.  We  had  shared  heat 
and  cold  together,  rain  and  sunshine,  labour,  endeav- 
our, and  much  patient  drudgery.  They  marched  with 
so  fine  a  swing,  their  young  faces  were  bright  with 
such  buoyant  hope,  their  eyes  were  so  steady  and 
so  clear,  that  I  wondered  if  the  human  race  had  ever 


302  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

flowered  into  anything  more  perfect.  And  there  rested 
on  them  too,  on  the  good  and  bad  ahke,  the  aureole  of 
consecration.  They  were  on  their  way  to  incalculable 
suffering,  to  a  world  of  horrors,  to  the  cold  embrace 
of  death,  but  they  were  not  afraid.  They  saluted 
death  with  songs. 

I  see  now  that  the  greatest  thing  In  life  is  not  to  be 
afraid.  I  do  not  mean  physical  courage  altogether, 
though  that  is  essential.  Every  man  shrinks  from  a 
sudden  blow;  that,  I  suppose,  is  the  working  of  the 
primeval  law  of  self-preservation.  I've  no  doubt 
when  the  first  explosive  shell  screams  over  me  I  shall 
duck  my  head.  That  will  mean  nothing  more  than  an 
animal  sense  of  peril,  an  instinct  which  we  share  with 
all  living  creatures.  And  I  have  as  little  doubt  that 
I  shall  overcome  that  form  of  fear  when  I  realise 
that  dropping  shrapnel  is  a  normal  feature  of  my  daily 
life,  and  in  the  end  shall  take  as  little  notice  of  it 
as  I  would  of  leaves  dropping  in  a  forest  or  hail  out 
of  a  winter  sky.  When  physical  peril  becomes  normal 
the  terror  of  it  disappears. 

But  there's  a  subtler  fear  bred  in  us  by  an  arti- 
ficial civilisation.  As  I  see  things  now,  I  recognise 
that  this  fear  lay  at  the  root  of  all  things  in  my  former 
life.  I  was  afraid  I  shouldn't  succeed  in  life,  afraid 
for  my  reputation,  afraid  to  do  anything  that  might 
hinder  the  development  of  my  mind,  afraid  even  of 
the  displeasure  of  my  critics  and  of  the  possibility 
of  interrupted  relations  with  my  public.  All  these 
things  appear  now  to  be  matters  of  no  moment.  I 
don't  really  care  whether  or  no  I  succeed  in  life,  as  sue- 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  303 

cess  was  measured  by  the  old  standards,  because  those 
standards  have  been  overthrown.  They  exist  for  me 
no  more,  and  with  their  disappearance  has  gone  a 
whole  world  of  trivialities,  a  whole  complicated  sys- 
tem of  hopes  and  fears,  of  manoeuvres  and  intrigues, 
of  selfish  aims  and  pushing  egoisms. 

And  with  them  has  gone  also  the  most  dismaying 
fear  of  all,  the  fear  of  death.  I  don't  quite  know 
how  it  has  happened.  I  remember  when  I  was  six- 
teen having  an  acute  fear  of  death.  I  hated  to  walk 
near  a  graveyard  or  hear  a  tolling  bell,  and  nothing 
could  have  persuaded  me  to  look  on  the  face  of  a 
corpse.  I  think  the  root  of  this  dismay  lay  in  a 
dreadful  fear  that  I  shouldn't  live  to  enjoy  life  thor- 
oughly. I  should  die  before  I  had  known  what  love 
was,  before  I  had  tasted  the  sweetness  of  a  girl's  kiss, 
before  I  had  travelled  and  seen  France  and  Italy; 
I  should  die  cheated  of  the  joys  of  living.  And  I 
wanted  to  live  so  intensely. 

I  think  it  is  because  we  want  so  many  things  in  life, 
or  because  we  have  them,  that  we  fear  death  so  much. 
But  if  once  those  things  we  covet  lose  their  value 
for  us,  we  don't  mind  losing  them.  Great  possessions, 
or  the  hope  of  them,  make  death  terrible. 

I  don't  quite  explain  myself;  but  what  it  comes  to 
is  that  I  don't  cling  to  life,  with  the  abject  fear  of 
losing  it  that  I  once  had.  Of  course  I  want  to  live, 
and  mean  to,  if  I  can;  but  I  don't  fear  death.  The 
fear  of  death  reached  me  through  the  fear  of  losing 
things;  but  now  that  my  hold  on  these  things  is  relin- 
quished the  thought  of  death  doesn't  trouble  me. 


304  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

The  poisonous  thing  in  our  old  modes  of  life  was 
that  we  were  all  clinging  to  life  in  a  kind  of  cowardly- 
desperation.     We  could  conceive  nothing  worse  hap- 
pening to  us  than  that  we  should  die.     We  would  not 
even  contemplate  the  thought  of  death,  made  believe 
it  didn't  exist,  were  like  children  who  think  they  can 
get  rid  of  something  they  don't  wish  to  see  by  hid- 
ing their  heads  beneath  the  bed-clothes.     We  amused 
ourselves  with  this  and  that  pursuit  which  dulled  the 
thought  of  death.     One  man  bought  pictures,  and  an- 
other built  up  estates,  each  trying  to  persuade  himself 
he  would  never  die;  his  years  were  secure  and  what- 
ever death  did  to  other  people  it  would  never  have  the 
effrontery  to  disturb  him.     We  wouldn't  look   facts 
in  the  face.     We  shut  ourselves  off  from  them  with 
all  kinds  of  ingenious  devices.     So  we  became  cow- 
ards, hiding  under  the  bed-clothes.     It's  all  changed 
now.     Reality  has  rushed  in  upon  us.     We  can't  go 
on  doing  the  little  things  we  loved  to  do.    We've  seen 
death,  and  it  wasn't  so  terrible  after  all.    We've  found 
a  strange  new  exhilaration  in  going  up  to  the  spectre, 
and  saying,  "You  can't  hurt  us,  after  all.    All  you  can 
do  is  to  take  us  away  from  certain  things  which  we 
thought  necessary  to  our  happiness,  but  which  we  now 
know  are  not.    And,  besides,  you  can't  touch  our  souls. 
They  laugh  at  you.     You'd  better  come  out  of  your 
corner,  and  cease  making  mouths  at  us,  and  get  out, — • 
you're  no  better  than  a  Hallowe'en  ghost  made  of  a 
lighted  pumpkin  on  a  stick,  and  we're  not  afraid  of 
you." 

And  then  the  child  ventures  out  of  the  bed-clothes, 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  305 

and  looks  toward  the  dark  corner,  and  behold  there's 
nothing  there.    Death  has  gone. 

So  I  try  to  write  my  thoughts,  as  I  sit  in  this  little 
tent,  lit  by  a  small  candle  which  shows  signs  of  go- 
ing out.  I've  not  succeeded  very  well,  but  I  think  I've 
got  at  the  truth  about  myself. 

The  day  is  coming  up  across  the  hills,  in  a  pale 
wash  of  grey  through  which,  as  through  the  milky 
dulness  of  an  opal,  elemental  fires  begin  to  pierce. 
The  camp  begins  to  stir  and  a  bugle  sounds,  thin  and 
clear  as  the  horns  of  Elfland. 

I  wonder  what  the  day  will  bring  for  me ! 


II 


I  make  haste  to  write  down  an  impression  that  has 
come  to  me,  lest  I  should  forget  it. 

It  was  while  I  was  engaged  in  the  ordinary  duties 
of  the  morning.  They  were  all  relatively  small,  of  lit- 
tle separate  importance,  and  yet  I  found  real  pleasure 
in  doing  them  because  I  saw  that  they  all  fitted  into 
something  that  was  of  great  importance.  For  exam- 
ple, there's  the  tedious  and  trivial  business  of  keep- 
ing oneself  smart — buttons  polished  till  they  shine  like 
gold,  boots  thoroughly  cleaned,  accoutrements  in  per- 
fect order,  one's  clothes  meticulously  neat,  and  so 
forth.  "What's  the  use  of  it  all?"  asks  the  civilian. 
"Isn't  it  absurd,  and  a  little  childish  too,  to  set  grown 
men  who  have  a  big  job  ahead  of  them,  to  these  paltry 
tasks?" 


3o6  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Well,  the  point  is  they  aren't  paltry.  They  are  vital 
factors  in  creating  self-respect  and  proper  pride.  A 
man  who  knows  himself  well  dressed  has  a  better  poise 
than  the  man  who  is  conscious  of  being  ill-dressed. 
The  officers  of  the  days  of  Marlborough  and  Turenne 
used  to  powder  their  wigs  before  they  went  into  bat- 
tle, and  put  on  their  finest  coats,  the  idea  being  that 
if  they  had  to  die  they  might  as  well  die  looking 
their  best,  as  well-dressed  gentlemen.  They  didn't 
fight  the  worse  because  they  were  gentlemen;  on  the 
contrary,  their  pride  in  their  appearance  reacted  on 
their  pride  in  valour,  helped  to  steady  them  and  give 
them  poise  and  imperturbable  serenity  in  the  hour  of 
danger. 

Time  hasn't  changed  human  nature  in  this  respect. 
When  men  are  taught  to  take  pride  in  their  appear- 
ance, we  know  they'll  take  pride  in  their  regiment 
too,  in  its  reputation,  its  honour,  its  traditions.  Slov- 
ens make  bad  soldiers.  They  are  likely  to  become 
slovenly  in  much  more  serious  matters  and  be  careless 
in  their  work.  And  to  be  careless  in  the  Army  is  a 
grave  offence,  for  the  lives  of  many  men  depend  upon 
the  conduct  of  each  individual  man. 

But  that's  not  quite  what  I  set  out  to  say. 

The  thought  that  came  to  me  this  morning  was  the 
extraordinary  sense  of  relief  and  release  one  has  in 
finding  his  whole  life  arranged  for  him,  without  any 
reference  to  his  active  will.  I  imagine  this  is  just  the 
way  mediaeval  men  felt  who  entered  religious  orders 
and  adopted  a  cloistral  life.  They  had  ceased  to  be 
responsible  for  the  daily  arrangement  of  their  lives. 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  307 

Each  hour  was  ordered,  each  had  its  definite  employ- 
ment, and  the  perturbation  of  conflicting  personal  de- 
sires had  ceased.     There  was  an  immense  gain  in  this. 

Army  life  rests  upon  the  same  base.  It  affords 
release  from  self.  It  exacts  complete  obedience,  just 
as  a  religious  order  does.  It  narrows  down  all  the 
various  and  divergent  duties  of  life  to  a  small  prac- 
ticable chart,  teaches  men  to  live  by  rule,  takes  from 
them  the  government  of  their  desires,  and  in  return 
gives  them  a  real  peace  of  mind.  I  have  never  had 
a  mind  so  much  at  peace  as  since  I  became  a  soldier. 
I  have  watched  the  same  effect  on  other  men.  Faces 
that  bore  many  signs  of  anxiety,  agitation,  desire,  have 
been  smoothed  out,  have  become  calm  and  steadfast. 
And  in  the  eyes  of  some  of  them — the  finer  sort — 
there  has  come  after  a  while  the  kind  of  serene  look 
one  sees  in  the  smiling  saints  of  mediaeval  artists. 

I  like  to  dwell  on  this  thought,  because  it  suggests 
an  analogous  conception  of  the  universe.  What  if  all 
men  are,  after  all,  units  in  the  vast  armies  of  God, 
who  is  willing  to  take  from  them  the  government  and 
burden  of  their  own  lives,  if  they  will  but  submit  to 
His  authority?  I  feel  as  if  this  is  somehow  true. 
At  any  rate  I  feel  that  nothing  can  give  me  so  much 
strength  and  such  real  peace  of  mind  as  to  think  that 
God  does  arrange  my  whole  life  for  me. 

I  want  the  help  of  such  a  thought  particularly  just 
now.  At  the  mess  to-day  all  sorts  of  rumours  went 
round  among  the  men.  Some  said  a  wire  had  come 
from  Ottawa  inviting  a  certain  number  of  officers  to 
volunteer  to  replace  the  heavy  casualties  at  the  Front. 


j^oS  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

Others  said  we  were  all  going  within  a  day  or  two — 
they  had  seen  the  order.  No  one  knew,  but  the  gist 
of  all  these  reports  was  that  our  time  in  camp  was 
very  near  its  close. 

That's  why  I  want  to  get  a  firm  grip  on  this  idea 
of  a  divine  arrangement  in  our  lives.  I  know  what 
I  want.  I  shall  be  dreadfully  disappointed  if  others 
go,  and  leave  me  in  camp.  I  shall  be  almost  as  badly 
disappointed  if  I  get  to  England,  only  to  kick  my  heels 
at  Salisbury  or  Folkestone,  as  lots  of  fellows  have 
done.  I  want  to  get  to  the  Front,  and  get  there 
quickly.  I  don't  know  whether  this  is  the  sort  of  thing 
I  ought  to  ask  God  for;  in  any  case  it  always  seems 
to  me  that  prayer  that  certain  earthly  things  may  come 
your  way  is  a  gross  impertinence  to  God,  because  it 
looks  as  though  you  think  He  needs  prompting  to  do 
the  right  thing.  So  I'm  not  going  to  pray  about  it, 
for  such  a  prayer  would  look  like  asking  God  to  do  my 
will,  whereas  the  chief  end  of  prayer  is  to  learn  to  do 
God's  will. 

But  I  am  going  to  pin  my  faith  to  the  wise  arrange- 
ment of  things.  I  am  a  man  under  authority,  and  I 
should  be  a  poor  soldier  if  I  didn't  trust  the  wisdom  of 
the  Powers  set  over  me. 


ni 


The  afternoon  mail  has  brought  me  a  letter  from 
Alice,    This  is  what  she  says: 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  309 

Paris,  October  30th,  191 5. 
My  dear  Caret  h  : 

When  are  you  coming  over?  Surely  you've  been 
in  training  long  enough.  We  want  you  so  much. 
You'll  never  know  how  badly  we  need  you  till  you  are 
really  here  and  see  things  for  yourself.  Day  by  day 
the  long  ambulance  trains  come  crawling  into  Paris 
full  of  maimed  and  battered  men.  O,  they  are  mar- 
vellously brave,  these  French  soldiers.  They  lie  quite 
silent,  waiting  their  turn,  with  the  kind  of  patient 
look  in  their  eyes  you  see  in  the  eyes  of  a  wounded 
dog.  At  first  I  couldn't  bear  to  look  at  them.  Such 
grief  and  pity  tore  my  heart  that  I  felt  an  uncon- 
trollable hysteric  wave  sweep  over  me.  I  wanted  to 
weep — and  weep.  But  there  was  something  in  their 
patient  calmness  that  steadied  me.  I  wonder  where 
we  English  and  Americans  got  the  notion  that  the 
French  were  volatile?  On  the  contrary,  they  seem 
to  me  born  stoics.  There's  a  hard  fibre  in  their  na- 
tures, something  firm  and  indomitable,  like  the  rock 
that  underlies  soft  loam,  and  turns  the  edge  of  the 
steel  ploughshare.  The  British  are  quite  different. 
They're  quite  as  courageous  under  pain,  but  they  seem 
to  think  it  a  point  of  honour  to  joke  about  it.  They 
endure  agony  by  pretending  it  doesn't  exist.  They 
laugh  it  out  of  existence.  The  French  don't  do  that. 
They  just  lie  still  and  suffer.  Their  big  dark  eyes 
hold  unfathomable  thoughts,  but  their  lips  are  silent. 
The  pathos  of  that  silence  is  something  that  defies 
description. 

The  French  will  never  be  conquered,  nor  will  the 


3IO  THE  WAR  EAGLE 

British.  The  reason  is  that  they're  gentlemen — they've 
got  tlie  great  quaHties  of  strength  and  gentleness  which 
the  old  knights  had.  Something  very  different  from 
the  Boche — who  mistakes  brutality  for  strength,  and 
despises  gentleness;  who,  because  he  does  this,  thinks 
it  a  fine  thing  to  shoot  village  priests,  rape  women, 
cut  off  children's  hands,  and  defile  the  rooms  of  an- 
cient chateaux  with  unnameable  animal  filth.  America 
doesn't  understand  this,  doesn't  believe  it,  because  she 
doesn't  know  the  true  Boche.  But  even  the  Boche  gets 
some  inkling  of  what  he's  like  now  and  then.  One  of 
the  best  of  them  once  said  to  an  Englishman  who 
pleaded  for  magnanimity  in  warfare,  "You  English- 
men will  always  be  fools,  and  we  Germans  will  never 
be  gentlemen."  He  spoke  the  truth — he  understood 
his  countrymen. 

I've  found  my  job.  I'm  in  the  hospital  for  face  and 
head  wounds.  Poor  fellows  come  here  with  their  jaws 
blown  away,  and  all  sorts  of  dreadful  injuries  to  the 
face  and  head.  The  business  of  our  surgeons  is  to 
build  up  new  faces  for  them,  and  this  they  do  in  a  man- 
ner almost  miraculous.  You've  no  idea  what  a  fine 
aquiline  nose  can  be  created  out  of  a  bit  of  a  man's 
shin-bone  grafted  into  the  face!  Horrible,  isn't  it? 
But  the  curious  thing  is  tliat  I've  become  quite  uncon- 
scious of  the  horror.  The  only  thing  I'm  conscious  of 
is  the  tremendous  need.  And  it's  not  so  long  ago  that 
I  should  have  fainted  at  sights  much  less  horrible 
than  these.  But  I'm  changed — we're  all  changed  in 
the  very  qualities  of  our  nature  by  this  war.  There's 
a  book  I  read  once,  the  life  of  a  woman  who  was  a 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  311 

nurse — she  said,  "When  you  touch  the  flesh  of  your 
patients  think  that  you're  touching  the  flesh  of  Christ, 
and  however  repulsive  they  may  be,  you  will  not  feel 
repulsion."  That's  how  I  feel.  I  realise  that  these 
wounds  are  sacrificial,  and  feel  there's  something  holy 
in  them;  they  make  me  think  of  the  wounds  of  Christ 
when  they  took  Him  down  from  the  Cross. 

You  know  how  I  went  to  this  work.  My  heart  was 
half  broken,  and  the  most  I  hoped  for  was  that  I  might 
forget  my  grief  in  a  life  of  strenuous  activity.  I've 
not  forgotten  my  grief,  but  in  some  mysterious  way 
it's  healed.  I  say  the  way  is  mysterious,  and  yet  it's 
really  very  simple.  It  all  comes  of  turning  your 
thoughts  outward  instead  of  inward  (the  same  discov- 
ery which  I  have  made).  I've  no  time  to  think  of 
myself;  there  are  too  many  things  to  be  done  for 
others.  I  go  to  bed  when  I  go — it's  not  every  night — 
wearied  out,  but  I  sleep  now  with  a  kind  of  peace  that 
I've  never  known  since  I  was  a  child.  I  suppose  it's 
the  same  in  the  trenches,  where  men  fall  asleep  amid 
mud  and  filth  and  corruption  with  a  more  complete 
composure  than  the  softest  pillows  ever  brought  them. 

O  Gareth — I  want  you  dreadfully  at  times.  I  hope 
the  thoughtful  Providence  that  shapes  our  ends  will 
let  you  come  through  Paris  on  the  way  to  the  Front. 
You  are  all  I  have — quite  all,  do  you  realise  that? 
I  can't  quite  bring  myself  to  speak  of  love — and  be- 
sides there's  the  censor  to  be  considered.  But  I  will 
ask  you  to  believe  that  through  life  to  death,  and 
maybe  beyond  death,  this  is  my  faithful  pledge. 

Only  and  always  your  Lynette. 


312  THE  WAR  EAGLE 


IV 


There's  a  great  shouting  in  the  Camp.  Men  are 
ninning  to  and  fro,  like  school-boys,  who  have  just 
been  granted  an  unexpected  holiday.  They  are  be- 
ginning to  sing — a  cornet  joins  in  and  dominates  their 
voices — it  is  the  National  Anthem  they  are  singing. 
My  batman  comes  pounding  over  the  grass,  his  face 
red  with  excitement,  his  hands  waving  wildly. 

"What  is  it?"  I  shout. 

"We're  all  going.    The  order's  come." 

I  gather  up  my  papers  quietly,  and  put  them  away. 
It  will  be  a  long  time  before  I  write  anything  again. 
I  have  the  sense  that  a  chapter  of  my  life  is  closed 
finally.  These  memoranda  of  my  thoughts  and  feel- 
ings which  I  have  written  down  at  odd  moments  repre- 
sent a  dead  self.  Another  self  has  risen  in  me,  which 
has  yet  to  prove  its  quality.  I  have  but  one  prayer, 
that  I  may  not  fail  beneath  the  test. 

I  am  profoundly  happy.  Never  before  have  I  been 
truly  happy.  But  I  am  now,  and  it  is  as  Alan 
Joddrel  said  in  quite  a  new  way.  The  new  way  is 
surrender,  and  it's  only  definition  is  the  saying  of  the 
old  mystic,  "In  finding  myself  I  lost  myself;  in  losing 
myself  I  found  both  myself  and  God." 

From  that  ended  past  one  beautiful  joy  has  been 
plucked,  my  love  for  Alice.  This  I  know  will  not 
wither.  It  is  a  flower  only  in  the  bud,  whose  full 
beauty  is  yet  to  be  revealed. 

I  don't  know  how  our  idyll  will  end,  but  I  am  sure 


SIX  MONTHS  LATER  313 

it  is  enduring.  We  shall  each  do  our  part  in  the 
tremendous  struggle,  and  God  will  write  its  last  lines 
as  He  sees  fit. 

The  bands  are  playing  now  before  the  verandah  of 
the  mess-room.  It's  the  old  air,  which  the  men  sang 
as  they  marched  away  three  days  ago : 

"Keep  the  Home-fires  burning, 
Till  the  boys  come  home." 

In  a  few  days  we'll  all  be  marching  down  the  same 
road  to  our  hidden  destiny,  and  there  will  be  none  who 
will  go  with  a  gladder  heart  than  I. 


FINIS 


.1 

I 


Los  Angeles 
Thu  book  u  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 

J  UN  0  4  1987 

' 

U(/N17J987 

J  ^002 

^ 

50m-7,'69(N296s4) — 0-120 

r>L_/  o ^  Z  "Z"J^""  "JT !"' " """  "Hi  II"  II  mill  II 

^         3   1158  00130  4574 


AA    000  369  112    8 


